Kame, Shinobi of the Sand
by DarthChungus
Summary: (Naruto 3rd Generation) Kame Hakiara is a Hidden Sand Shinobi growing up on the legends of Naruto and Gaara, fifty years after the Fourth Shinobi World War. He wants to use his ingenuity and talent to become like the ultimate ninja he's read about, but encounters many roadblocks both moral and physical on his path to greatness.
1. Arc 1 Vol 1: Enter, Kame Hakiara!

**(A/N) Welcome! This story is my response to Boruto, my own take on what a sequel to Naruto should have looked like, and I will do my damndest to avoid actively contradicting canon at any point. That said, if you notice any points where I did, or read anything you disagreed with, or have any feedback at all, I'd love to hear all of it!** **This is my only running fanfiction story, and I try to update it with 4-6k word chapters at least twice a week barring any personal or family issues.**

* * *

 _Looking back on the days where we were all genin, it still surprises me how sure I was about what my path would be. I suppose all children must be like that, yet with the benefit of hindsight now, I can only see myself as a misguided fool. I had a dream of becoming one of the greatest shinobi, yet I made so many mistakes along the way, so many decisions that ended poorly, and lost so many people forever._

 _I suppose it's ironic that I spent so long chasing after that ideal of greatness, but now that I've reached that final goal of mine, I can safely way I'd trade it away to have back all the sacrifices I made. Then again, though, those came later, when the stakes were higher. At the very beginning, I was just a genin with no idea how important the choices I made really were... but then again, there was one choice I made that I will never regret._

 _\- Kame Hakiara_

* * *

 **Shinobi Union Registry Files (Genin) (Hidden Sand):**

 **Date: 50 A4 (50 years after Fourth Shinobi World War)**

 **Academy Exam Graduation Data: Kame Hakiara**

Ninjutsu: A  
\- Notes: _Multiple nature transformations and excellent grasp of basic jutsu_

Genjutsu: C  
\- Notes: _Able to dispel and cast, but only at a bare minimum level_

Taijutsu: B  
\- Notes: _Can hold his own against most other students, excellent aim with thrown weapons_

Appearance: _Normal height (5'5") and weight (110 lbs), built on the thin side, short and messy sandy-blond hair. Typically wears utilitarian and many-pocketed clothing underneath Sand genin vest._

Attitude: _Shows definite desire to excel but troubling resistance to work with other students less skilled than he is. Never disrespectful to teachers or in front of them, but also demonstrates dismissive behavior towards majority of his classmates._

History: _Comes from the_ _Hakiara clan, which is relatively new to the Hidden Sand (only fourth generation residents), and migrated to the Sand from the Heat Devil Village partially through their war with the Hidden Leaf. Due to their traditions, Kame was raised in seclusion within the clan, though that meant isolation from other children, until he entered the academy. Immediately excelled due to extensive pre-academy training and natural drive, and graduated at the minimum age, fourteen._

* * *

"Kame Hakiara, pass with a score of ninety-eight out of a hundred," the teacher said, nodding to Kame as he walked down the row and towards the door. "It's been a pleasure teaching you."

"Thank you." Kame gave the man one last respectful nod, then exited through the side door out into the dirt ground of the academy's courtyard. Penned in on all four sides by the walls of the academy itself, the small yard was where he'd eaten most of his lunches for the last four years- but now, it was the site of his next test. All of the tables had been cleared away and benches moved to make room for a long line of targets and corresponding numbered spaces on the other side of the yard, each of which had five kunai and five shuriken laid on them.

Kame took his position on the number one at the furthest corner of the yard, testing the weight of the provided weapons to make sure they were standard issue. _Two more tests_ , he thought to himself, _and then I'm officially a genin of the Hidden Sand_. The genjutsu test had been relatively simple- just releasing the illusory genjutsu that the instructor laid on him, which he'd done successfully. Next came the taijutsu test, which had been a little trickier but not particularly problematic, and then the written test on ninja history and chakra theory, which he'd finished first out of the class and with an excellent score to boot.

As more and more students filed out of the written test classroom, the weapons teacher, Nagano, dropped down into the courtyard and scanned the assembled applicants. Nagano was by all appearances a prototypical Sand shinobi, clad in standard durable clothing underneath his sand chunin vest. However, Kame had learned from experience over the last four years that the man demonstrated his loyalty through unusual mediums: high standards and tough love to anyone under his tutelage.

Suddenly, he felt an odd urge to look up and obeyed it, glancing towards a third-story window looking down on the courtyard. There he saw a flash of white and blue motion, but it was gone almost immediately and he was left mildly confused. _Who would-_

His curiosity was interrupted when, now that apparently everyone who would come out here, had, Nagano began barking out instructions: "Everyone listen up! This is your final exam for weapons use, and I think that you can probably figure out what it is based on what's sitting right in front of you." _We're to demonstrate a minimum accuracy level_ , Kame reasoned, all traces of the white blur now gone from his mind. All the tests up to this point had been pass-or-fail and weeded out a few unskilled students each, so it stood to reason that this one would be the same. The targets on the far wall, perhaps ten meters away, were large wooden ones suspended by nails, each a meter wide and with three concentric circles around a bullseye.

"On the other hand, some of you are complete idiots, so I'm gonna explain it anyway!" Nagano pointed towards the targets. "You sorry lot are to throw five consecutive shuriken towards those targets. If you can get at least three of them to stick in the inner ring, you pass, and if you can't, you fail! I can pass or fail you on my own, regardless of the rules, so if you're planning to slide by on a technicality then get a new plan."

The line of twenty or so students readied themselves to throw their shuriken, and on his shout of "Go!" the throws began. Kame steadied his breathing, assumed the stance that was well-written into his memory, and narrowed his vision in on the target before releasing with a flick of his wrist. The shuriken whizzed forward and sank into the very edge of the eight-inch-diameter bullseye. He readied another one, wound up, and repeated the process four more times, ending up with four bullseyes and one hit into the inner ring.

He then leaned back into the wall and waited as the other students made their own attempts, glancing around in boredom until he felt an urge to look up towards one of the windows looking down into the yard. Once he looked up there, he caught the faintest glimpse of a white form- but it was gone as soon as he noticed it, and his attention was brought back to earth by Nagano's shouting: "Alright, now if you're looking at your unsatisfactory performance and finally realizing just how useless you are, don't worry! You get one more chance, this time with the kunai!"

Kame picked up said kunai and grabbed it by the hilt, weighing it one more time before launching it towards the target. Once there, it stabbed point-first into the wood and sank in a centimeter, shaking free one of the less-secure shuriken. The next three kunai went much the same way, two more hitting the bullseye and one plunking into the inner ring. The last one, though, he got overconfident on and flung directly into one of his own shuriken, which it promptly bounced off of and missed the target completely.

Nagano strode over from his position behind the students to congratulate Kame: "Excellent! Exemplary work, Kame!" The teacher marked down the final results on a clipboard, continuing in a proud tone. "You pass the kunai and shuriken test with flying colors." Kame cracked a smile; he'd managed to perform significantly above the passing requirements with seven bullseyes, two inner-ring hits, and one that would have been a bullseye were it not for the shuriken in the way.

"Thank you, Nagano-sensei. May I move on to the next test?" He'd left some interesting experiments at his home, and the sooner he finished with the academy graduation exam the sooner he'd get to finish them.

"Actually, Kame, I'd like you to stay until the other students are finished. You can sit down over there for now." Nagano pointed towards one of the viewing benches behind the range and Kame complied, walking over to it and taking a seat. _Well, I guess if I can't move on, I might as well check out some of my competition_ , he thought. Looking at the other students, the majority of them were clearly average, but a few were noticeably unable to complete the requirements. _Which is weird,_ he thought, _because historically ninja have been held to much higher standards at much earlier ages._ In the decades of peace after the Fourth Shinobi World War, the ninja villages had less need of soldiers and so children had significantly more time to be... well, children. Kame, as well as most of his classmates, was now fourteen, the minimum age to graduate into a genin squad. _The ninja before had to pass these tests at a much younger age, but most of my classmates can't even do very well with all those extra years, huh?_

Although he could have named most of the students, there were a few that he didn't recognize by appearance- Due to the class system in the Hidden Sand, students were placed with different kids for each of their classes in order to keep familiarity with all of the other students but to prevent any close friendships (at least until the genin teams were established). Despite this, he'd developed a repartee with a few of the other students, namely Tetsute Hasagi and Rakuyo Kuyanari. They shared the projectiles class and as the top three performers they'd developed a healthy little competition that soon became a friendship. Kame, who hadn't had many friends growing up, had gravitated towards the other two hard workers in his classes, and soon they would meet after hours to practice their jutsu or even just talk. Tetsute's short brown hair and eyes did little to distract from his ever-present smirk, but the few people who took offense at his attitude had quickly learned their lesson and left the burly boy alone.

Looking over at him, Kame noticed his rival had managed two bullseyes. He held his breath as the boy lined up his final throw, but released it in a sigh when he noticed the stance and alignment. As expected, Tetsute, like him, got cocky on his final toss and missed the target completely- still easily passing, but not cracking Kame's accomplishment. He appeared to have the same conversation with the teacher and then walked over and sat down next to Kame.

"Hey, bro, guess who just got seven bullseyes and an inner circle?" Tetsute smirked and opened his arms wide in glory.

Kame laughed out loud. "Me. And I got two inner circles instead of one, so... you lose."

Tetsute's face fell and he narrowed his eyes. "Did you practice especially just to beat me?"

He stared suspiciously at his rival, but Kame kept his face bemused. "I don't need to practice especially to beat _you_."

"Ohh…" Rakuyo walked up from behind Kame, black ponytail bobbing as she stifled a laugh behind her hands. Her hazel-green eyes sparkled with amusement at the well-delivered insult. "You just gonna take that, Tetsute?"

Tetsute rolled his eyes, although there was a little glimmer of anger underneath at being humiliated in front of his schoolboy crush. "Whatever. I beat you at taijutsu, so we're even."

"Actually, I think I win this one, boys." Rakuyo held up ten fingers. "All bullseyes. Feel free to bow in adoration now." Kame raised an eyebrow and Tetsute mock-bowed before shaking his head.

He appeared to count something on his fingers and then said, "So that puts Rakuyo at the top with first place in weapons and second place in taijutsu, and me in second with first place in taijutsu and third place in weapons. How's it feel to be the weakest link, huh, Kame?"

"You're forgetting the written test. I got first, you second, and Rakuyo third; so now we're all tied up." Kame smiled. "I guess it all comes down to the ninjutsu test, huh?" Tetsute simply smiled and cracked his knuckles while Rakuyo stretched hers. "Well, may the best ninja wi-" Kame was cut off by Nagano's voice ringing out across the courtyard.

"Well, regardless of results, I'm proud of each and every one of you- _not_. If you failed here, have fun taking another year where I try my absolute hardest to keep you from sucking more. That means you; Naburo, Kekeno…" As the sensei listed off all of the failures, the usual suspects walked out, sulking or pretending not to care. All in all, Kame counted ten kids who were unable to pass, leaving ten more standing in the courtyard. However, the last of those ten names came as a mild surprise to Kame: "And Haku."

 _Haku?_ Kame searched his mind and couldn't remember a student named Haku. He knew most of his classmates' names by now, if not from seeing them then by hearing Tetsute or Rakuyo mention them. _How did I miss a person?_ As he searched his mind, his question was answered as a tall girl in a worn purple coat strode up to the teacher and started arguing with him. Curious, he detached himself from his two friends and drifted over, eavesdropping unobtrusively.

When he got a good look at her, his heart skipped a beat. She was striking, prettier than he'd expected from the antisocial girl hiding in the corner, with purple hair, purple eyes, and pale skin, standing as all as he was. Her face was dejected as she talked at the teacher, getting more and more so as he got within earshot and listened closely.

Nagano's voice was stern. "I'm sorry Haku, but you simply did not meet the requirement."

"I… I don't… why won't you let me pass? I hit the target every time…"

"Haku, the purpose of this exercise was to show that you can land at least two shuriken _or_ kunai into the inner circle of a target. You demonstrated that you can hit the outer circle of the target, but you simply don't have the-" Nagano's lecture was cut off as Haku talked over him.

"But you let Genji pass, and he didn't get it done either!"

"Genji has regularly passed all tests up to this point, and I'm confident that this time was just a fluke." Nagano sighed as the girl did something. Looking up, Kame saw that she was picking up a stray shuriken from the ground and getting into a ready stance. She lined up her throw, and Kame could already see that it wasn't going to hit. He stepped in right before she released and called out.

"Wait, stop." Nagano and Haku both looked back, the former annoyedly. Nagano's face changed as he recognized one of his star pupils, but Haku's eyes widened as she straightened up and turned to face him.

"Why… do you want to say something about me?" She seemed defensive and he made a mental note to watch how he talked to her.

"No, I'm here to help you pass. If you'd thrown the shuriken like that, you'd have missed the target completely." Kame explained, holding up his palm in a gesture of peace.

Haku's eyes became puzzled and confused for a brief moment, before hardening again. "I don't know why you want to help me, but please just leave me alone, I can handle this." With that, she lined up to throw again, aiming towards the target. Kame visualized the path her shuriken would take- it would go too low and hit the widened base of the wooden target, a good foot or two away from the actual bulls-eye.

She drew back, and he interjected once more: "Haku, stop." When she turned again, her cheeks were flaming and she bit her lip rather than respond, so Kame filled in the silence. "Okay, just get into your stance but don't throw." After a brief moment of stillness, she did as he said and dropped into a ready stance. He reached forward and moved her arm down a little bit, rolled her wrist back, and then backed up. "Okay, now try it."

Haku glanced back at him briefly, but like before seemed to lose her nerve and drop her gaze to the ground before turning around and throwing the kunai. This time, with the added control granted by a mobile wrist and the added power from a full arm extension, she was able to send the kunai streaking forward and plunging into the inner circle- admittedly only barely, and at an odd angle, but it _was_ there alongside another two more of her kunai.

She smiled hesitantly, turning around and looking hopefully at Nagano, then gratefully towards Kame before striding off towards the ninjutsu testing classroom. Nagano opened his mouth but then appeared to think better of it, stopping himself, then shrugging and walking away. He muttered, "Well, she sure as hell isn't gonna pass the ninjutsu test, so she's someone else's problem now."

Kame blinked a few times, slightly confused as to why he'd just helped her. _I've never really had an urge to help my classmates before_ , he thought, _so why...?_ He was still lost in thought when Rakuyo ran up and slapped him on the back. "What's the big idea running off like that? Why are you messing with Kodoku?"

"No, I just… Kodoku? I thought her name was Haku." He craved more information.

"She's a weird one... are you sure that you don't remember her? I feel like we've definitely talked about her before. She's in my ninjutsu class and she can't even perform basic jutsu; I really don't understand what her problem is. She should've given up a long time ago, but..." Rakuyo trailed off briefly, then brightened up a bit. "Hey, have you heard of Might Guy?"

Kame remembered his research on all the greatest ninja of the modern age. _Might Guy..._ he suddenly remembered who she was talking about: _oh, yeah! Might Guy, wasn't he the one who fought and lost to Madara Uchiha after Madara absorbed the tentails?_ "Yeah, the Leaf's taijutsu master. His ninjutsu and genjutsu were nonexistent, though, so I wrote him off at first…"

Rakuyo laughed. "You'd think so, right? But he was recognized as strong by Madara himself and... Anyway, Haku reminds me of those stories, except her attitude isn't respectful or diligent enough to achieve anything near that level. Back when she first enrolled, she was decent at taijutsu, but pretty soon me and Tetsute showed her her place and now she's actually pretty pathetic. She doesn't even try to stand up for herself when people... anyway, I don't know what she expects is gonna happen in the ninjutsu test. Hey, wait a minute, how the hell did she even pass the genjutsu test!?" Rakuyo seemed annoyed.

Kame considered for a moment but then realized that they were late for the final test on ninjutsu. "Let's go, we don't want to fail by default."

"Heh, Tetsute would never let us hear the end of it." Rakuyo jogged off towards the classroom and he followed along, seeing that the location was the same stark classroom where they'd been learning and practicing their basic jutsu all year. They walked in and took the only two available seats, so Rakuyo ended up next to Tetsute and Kame was forced into the back, sharing a desk with Miriki Kosuki, the pretty-boy of their age group. The vain prick was examining his nails and occasionally shaking a length of perfectly-kept dark hair out of his bright blue eyes, completely ignoring him as he sat down. _I can't believe Loverboy passed all of the tests leading up to this..._ Kame turned to glance at his classmate again, but was surprised to see that the Kosuki boy was looking at him intently. _What is he-_

His thoughts were cut off as the teacher looked around at all the students and then checked a list in his hands. "Alright, students, this is your final test before you get the chance to become genin, and I daresay it is also the most important! Ninja are best known, and for good reason, for their mastery of the ninjutsu style. Almost every rank chunin-or-higher ninja has a high level of mastery with several complex ninjutsu, but as new genin you are only expected to be able to perform a few basic ones. The one we'll be testing today is the clone jutsu!"

The class broke down into whispering and muttering, but neither Kame nor Miriki were fazed by the announcement. Kame's clone jutsu was both reliable and convincing- he'd mastered it quickly and moved on to more challenging ones. He might even show off a little for this-

"Kame Hakiara! As the strongest ninjutsu user in the class, would you like to demonstrate?" The instructor looked at him and he smiled.

"Of course". He made his way down the aisle and to the front of the class.

"Feel free to use the jutsu whenever you'd like," The instructor directed him. Kame smiled and then made the correct hand signs before focusing his chakra. He felt the power whirl within him and ordered it, as directed by the hand signs, to form into being beside him. With perfect focus, he mirrored the chakra creation with his own chakra network and then released the jutsu. Standing beside him was an exact copy of himself, which he turned and shook hands with.

"Very good job, Kame, you may return. Full marks." The instructor marked his score down on the clipboard and gestured him to go back to his place, which he did, dismissing the clone and returning to his seat.

The other classmates all went, some creating imperfect clones but all of them at least managing something. The instructor graded harshly this year, refusing to give points to those who made clones that did not appear similar to themselves. Miriki walked up and made a perfect clone on his turn, as did Rakuyo and Tetsute. Kame couldn't wait to form a team with the latter two, as soon as everyone finished their testing. As the classroom of ten or so ninja students finished up, only Haku was left.

Her name was called and she walked up slowly, head hung, and he started when someone gently placed their hand on his shoulder. He turned to see Miriki looking at her sadly and speaking in a soft, unnecessarily harmonious voice: "She's not going to be able to do it. Not for lack of trying, but she's been incapable of it all year."

Kame frowned, turning back towards Haku's display. He looked on as she made the handsigns perfectly and channeled her chakra, but he didn't need any visual kekkeigenkai to see what was going on- she didn't have enough focus or chakra control, and the chakra she sent out to form the clone was simply dissipating. After a few seconds Tetsute laughed and he felt even worse. She responded by tilting her head downwards more and starting to straighten up.

Kame's impulse pushed him and before he knew what he was doing he flashed through several handsigns and sent out his own chakra beside her. He formed his chakra correctly and managed to cast two jutsu in perfect unison, which resulted in a figure appearing beside Haku out of nowhere. His combination clone and transformation jutsu made it look like she'd successfully, if a bit sloppily, made a clone of herself. He hadn't had her chakra network to work with, so it only looked somewhat like her, but another student had been passed despite making a clone that was far worse so Kame's should be up to par.

She jerked up and glanced beside her at the clone of herself, then looked around the room trying to mask her confusion. The instructor squinted at the clone and then at Haku, before looking up at the rest of the classroom, his eyes finally settling on Kame. He peered at Kame, and then at the clone, and then appeared to consider briefly, but Kame already knew the outcome. They would never fail their star pupil for something like this, and they probably didn't want to teach the crippled Haku for another year, so the logical outcome would be for them to simply let it go and pass her.

"Haku, you… pass. Go take your seat." She bit her lip again and darted back to her seat, so Kame dismissed the jutsu. _Wait,_ he thought, _what the hell did I just do? I barely even know her and now I'm helping her pass this test?_

Miriki beside him whispered, "Hey dude, nice one! Although, why would you help her- do you even know her?" Kame shrugged and sat back in his chair. He was as confused as Miriki was about the matter. In fact, he was so focused on himself that he failed to notice Miriki's hands releasing a jutsu of his own.

"Alright, class, if you're still in this room, you've shown acceptable levels of competence in every basic aspect of shinobi arts. Congratulations! You may now all come and receive your headbands, and carved onto the back of the metal you'll find your ninja identification numbers. The first number in that long string of them is your team number, which is also the classroom you will go to to meet with your squadmates tomorrow. Once again, congratulations. As soon as you pick up your headband you are officially a Sand village genin." All six of the remaining students walked up to the teacher to receive their headbands one after the other, and Kame winced at the scorching glare that the teacher gave him on his turn.

The room cleared out very quickly, after which Kame met up with Rakuyo and Tetsute outside. They all wore their headbands on their foreheads with big smiles on their faces. "We did it!" They shared an awkward three-way high-five. Maybe it wasn't rare for students to graduate the academy on their first attempt, but it definitely wasn't a minor achievement. Although Kame had been confident that he'd pass while going into the test, it was still reassuring to know that he'd put the milestone behind him.

Suddenly, a thought occurred to him. "Uh, guys?" They turned and their faces fell somewhat as they saw the worried expression on his face.

"What?" They asked in unison.

"If they gave us our squad assignments, then that means we aren't choosing for ourselves, which means we might not be together…" He did his best to keep his voice hopeful, but in reality he was panicking a little bit. A ninja's squad was important, they'd be together for their entire careers and he didn't want to end up alone with two weirdos. He hadn't been present for the fifteen- and sixteen-year-olds' graduations, which meant that there was probably a large pool of possible ninja for him to end up on a team with.

He tried to remain confident despite the panic that he usually suffered when his larger plans went awry starting to set in. "No, I'm sure that they… Well, I mean, we can check." He pulled off his own headband, flipped it over, and looked at it. It read: "8. Well, did you guys get Eight?" He looked up hopefully at his only two friends, who slowly shook their heads.

"No, I got seven." Tetsute said apologetically.

"Hey! I got seven, too!" Rakuyo smiled at him. They high-fived again, elated to be on the same team after all. Kame tried to be happy for them.

"Wow, that's… really great, I guess…" He said sadly. They didn't even notice his suddenly depressed spirit and he walked away without another word. As he left the academy grounds, he noticed Haku walking off towards the wall of the city, head down and hands in her pockets. For some reason, there was very little memory about her- which was incredibly strange, given how amused Rakuyo had been by her. _She talked about it like it was an inside joke between us..._

Shaking his head to clear his mind, Kame made it home without a hitch, coming in and immediately setting some water to boil. Both his parents were Sand shinobi and were out on missions at the moment, leaving him to take care of himself. This wasn't an uncommon situation; after he'd turned eleven they'd recommitted to their jobs as Land of Wind border security. In fact, they'd earned enough repute to be in the reinforcement corps, a special squad that rapidly moved around the border constantly to counter shifting threats and situations.

Kame's earlier years had been fairly isolated, in the tradition of the Heat Devil Village. Children there were raised purely within the clan and trained from a young age, but due to their clan's relative lack of other people he'd been kept from _all_ other children. His time had been filled with books and reading, and although he'd like to call it 'research', honesty demanded that he admit to himself that it was really just him obsessing over stories of famous ninja. He had very garbled memories of being resistant to ninja training at first, but that had all changed once he'd started to read accounts of historical ninja's exploits. Kame had fallen in love almost immediately with the tales of Gaara, Naruto, and Sasuke unleashing unbelievable powers to beat back terrible threats and save the world with their own hands.

From that point until the present day, his dream had been to become a household name like them. He didn't just want to be a ninja, he wanted to be one of the great ones. To blaze his own path, despite not having a kekkeigenkai or a tailed beast, and achieve the sort of lasting greatness that later generations would be learning about in _their_ history classes. His parents had been glad to teach him until age eleven, at which point his parents had gotten their promotion and they'd started rapidly going all over the Land of Wind's border, shifting from town to town. That kind of constant movement wasn't the best for raising a child, much less a child trying to focus on their education, so they'd opted to leave him at home alone far more than most kids his age- which, to be fair, he didn't really mind. The peace and quiet gave him time to think and also to work on his paperbombs.

He'd found and decided a while ago that he had an affinity for the ninja tools, and quickly learned how to create and disarm them. Ever since, he'd been experimenting with different levels of power and area, along with trying to compress the runes for greater efficiency. So far, he'd managed to create not only an array of varyingly strong bombs, but also a few specialty ones like the flame-spreading one he'd dubbed a 'firebomb'. That one had required his fire release to work, but now it was a special edge in any fight he had- _or will be, once I get into an actual fight._ Due to the highly destructive nature of paperbombs, Kame had been ill-suited for the casual sparring matches that had been his only chance at fighting other shinobi so far.

He heard the water finish and made himself some instant noodles, taking them into his workshop and starting to experiment with trying to streamline the detonation process. Perhaps if he could infuse an air-based change of nature while creating the change in nature, the explosion would become more forceful and less damaging. A concussive bomb could prove very useful for both non-lethal uses and also as a way to move things around. _Okay then, let's see what we can do with this,_ he thought as he dove in to work on using the new idea. As Kame's hands busied themselves with drawing up the paperbomb's seal, the familiar motions comforted him enough to bring his thoughts to a more positive tone: _Whoever I end up with, I'm sure I can make it work_.


	2. Arc 1 Vol 2: Formation of Team Eight

**Shinobi Union Registry Files (Active Genin) (Hidden Sand):**

 **Academy Graduation Exam Data: Miriki Kosuki**

Ninjutsu: C  
\- Notes: _Decent grasp of basic jutsu and single nature transformation despite obvious lack of effort_

Genjutsu: B  
\- Notes: _Adept at utilizing, detecting, and neutralizing genjutsu of all types_

Taijutsu: D  
\- Notes: _Physically weak and resistant to changing that, no particular talent or skill_

Appearance: _Normal height (5'5") and weight (122 lbs), physical build also typical, medium-length and permanently styled black hair. Typically forgoes Sand genin vest and instead wears long white coats with expensive clothing underneath._

Attitude: _Shows very little desire for improvement, only really demonstrates growth in genjutsu. Socially very popular, though a few students are openly hostile towards him, and proves to be a distraction for many female students. This seems to go both ways, as he also_ _pays more attention to chasing girls than his teachers._

History: _Comes from Kosuki clan, a prominent and incredibly wealthy clan of the Hidden Sand, and is the child of the current clan head. Grew up rich and respected by most people around him, yet is impressively tactful, which is less than surprising. The Kosuki clan, while never producing ninja, historically have proven to be highly successful in economics and politics both. Miriki's decision to join the academy and break from the tradition of a long line of pacifists is an unexpected one, and at somewhat at odds with his lackadaisical attitude towards ninja training._

* * *

Kame blinked his way back into the world of the waking, groaning as he pried himself off his worktable. He'd been more tired out than he thought by the stress of the graduation testing and must have fallen asleep at his station, which could have been bad. _I've r_ _eally got to pay better_ attention, he thought, _one of these days I'll blow myself up if I'm not careful..._

Noticing that it was almost time to leave for the academy and his squad placements, he threw together a quick breakfast and hurried out the door. _Can't be the last one there, that's definitely a bad way to start things off with my team._ He jogged all the way there, fastening his headband on as he went and returning greetings from the occasional friendly neighbor until he finally arrived at the academy.

He strode in the open door and past all the other excited students, but froze when he saw Rakuyo and Tetsute chatting happily outside their own classroom. He briefly debated talking to them, but stopped when he saw them laughing and enjoying themselves without him. _Better not to twist the knife in deeper_ , he thought bitterly, _and at least let them be happy_.

Turning down the hall he saw the classroom sign on the right labeled Eight and braced himself to meet his new teammates. Thinking hard, he decided that he probably wanted some of the more skilled upper age group ninja, honestly he didn't care specifically who as long as they were somewhat competent. _Whoever is up there listening to thi_ _s, please let me get some squadmates who are skilled ninja_ , he thought. _Actually, I can be the ninjutsu specialist of the squad… let them be decent taijutsu and genjutsu users, I guess._

Finally he got up the necessary confidence and pushed the door open to be confronted with an empty classroom. Checking the clock, he saw that he was right on time… _So why isn't anybody here?_ he wondered. _I guess I might as well_ _take a seat._ He slid into a chair in the front row and absentmindedly pulled out a paperbomb, one of the ones he'd developed last night. The blast was now a burst of wind that had much greater concussive power, at the cost of any heat or flame whatsoever.

As his hands worked, an idea struck him- If he managed to make it into a paper airplane of sorts, then he could send it out on its own in special flight patterns and detonate it remotely. He became so wrapped up in his little project that he jumped at the sudden noise of the door opening.

Looking up, he saw a black-haired figure wearing a long white coat back into the room. "Sorry, babe, but I need to be getting to my important ninja training now!" Miriki Kosuki waved one last goodbye to the giggling girl in the hallway and then turned around to see Kame holding his head in his hands. "Oh, hey, Kame! How's it going, _new teammate_?"

Kame sent up a silent complaint. _When I said a genjutsu specialist, I didn't mean this guy_. "Uh, hey there, Miriki, so… you're going to be on my team, huh? That's… great." He tried to hide his ramping disappointment at losing Tetsute and Rakuyo and getting the resident ladies' man as a replacement. Still, there might be hope in the last ninja on their team…

"Hey, don't write me off just yet, okay?"

Kame's head shot up as his eyes became confused. _How did Miriki know what I was thinking?_ "What? I'm not… I don't mean to offend you, it's just that you don't seem very powerful and in our shared classes you didn't demonstrate an aptitude for anything except genjutsu, which you also weren't particularly skilled at."

Miriki shrugged. "Eh, that's fair. However, you haven't seen me really try yet; you might be pleasantly surprised… anyway, do you know who our last member will be?" He also took a seat in the middle of the classroom. "Whoever they are, they're late."

With perfect timing, the door banged open and a girl strode through it hurriedly. Kame's jaw dropped and his eyes opened wide, as his brain was too busy registering the extreme irony of his situation. The kunoichi who walked in was mostly covered up by a dirty, worn-out purple coat, her face shaded by the hood, but the flash of her purple eyes was enough for Kame to identify her.

Miriki greeted her. "Haku! Wow, did we luck out today. We've got the strongest masters of each respective branch of jutsu on our squad!"

That was a very positive way to think about it. "Yeah, but you can't do taijutsu, I'm no good at genjutsu, and she can _only_ do taijutsu."

Haku threw back her hood, but wouldn't meet his eyes. "I… I can handle myself."

A sudden little flare of competitiveness awakened inside him and he opened his mouth without thinking. "Just like you handled yourself at the ninjutsu test yesterday? I had to save you from flunking back to the academy for another year." He regretted the words the instant they left his mouth, but it was too late.

Haku looked taken aback and immediately opened her mouth to issue a retort. However, the words never left her, and she just looked back at the ground. "Thanks for that. But now… now that I'm out of there, I can succeed as a ninja, even if I don't have ninjutsu or genjutsu."

Kame frowned. "Or you could work with the team and we could make up for each others' shortcomings…?" He tossed out the peace offering and she quieted, shrugging her agreement and sitting down cross-legged on the floor at the front of the classroom.

"Now then, where's our squad leader? He's awfully late, this might be a bad sign about him…" Miriki complained, sighing and sitting back in his chair. "Maybe he just doesn't care enough to even arrive?" Kame thought, _I guess that would make him your kind of person, eh_? As much as Haku confused him, Miriki flat-out annoyed him, with his endless hitting on girls to his extremely unprofessional attitude towards almost everything. He might belong to an incredibly wealthy family, but that shouldn't excuse him from the same standards of conduct that everyone else conformed to.

"Nope!" The door that Haku had carefully closed behind herself was literally kicked off of its hinges, and a man staggered through it. His ruddy red hair was a disheveled mess, and his cheeks were covered with stubble, clearly in desperate need of shaving. His eyes were at first wild and then dulled a bit as he bent over and panted for a good ten seconds before speaking again in a slightly slurred voice: "You... you all're... what was I...?" he trailed off, before looking downcast. "Oh yeah, you're the new kids I have to babysi- I mean, teach."

Kame immediately straightened up and respectfully bowed to the man. "Deihaka-sensei! I am honored to be on the team of such an important ninja." He was relatively new as a jonin, but climbed the ranks somewhat quickly out of nowhere. After flying under the radar for years, at age thirty-one he'd ascended from genin to jonin in a few short months. _His jutsu specialty i_ s… Kame tried to remember... _Oh yeah, the magnet release, like the Third Kazekage._

Deihaka smiled faintly at the praise. "I'm glad that you heard of me..." The three genin in the room turned to look at him as silence dragged on for more painful seconds, until he seemed to notice the situation and start talking again: "Right. You may be sand chunin now... wait, no, sand genin, but I'm still your superior and I have the right to send you back to the academy. Looking at you, I don't know if I wanna do this teacher thing..." Miriki opened his mouth to protest, but Deihaka just kept talking. "I'm giving you a chance to prove me wrong, though, so... follow me."

They walked out from the academy and Kame noticed that no other group had left their classroom. "I'm sorry, Deihaka-sensei, but why aren't any other groups doing this? Are we the only ones who performed unsatisfactorily?"

Deihaka didn't turn, but responded almost... shyly? "Don't worry 'bout it." _He's trying to act mysterious,_ Kame noticed, _but he's not a very good actor. Whatever the reason for this test is, it isn't to gauge our individual combat abilities._ They made it to the doors of the arena and stepped in to find it empty of any ninja. On the sandstone floor, there were scattered wooden structures and ninja tools, random at first glance, but as Kame looked closer there were far too many to be just left over from another group.

Haku took off her ragged, tattered coat to reveal an outfit comprised of a purple collared top and a short skirt, with bandages poking out onto her arms, legs, and midriff. Miriki was clad in his usual flowing white robelike coat. Kame swallowed his annoyance; he'd always harbored a tiny little disgust with people who didn't wear typical ninja garb. It screamed of insecurity and neediness. Haku's was semi-acceptable kunoichi wear, but Miriki looked like some sort of fashionable monk.

His attention was yanked from the clothing of his squadmates when Deihaka stopped in the middle of the arena and pulled out two bells. "This is a little trial that I learned from the Hidden- I mean, made up myself, and I think it's a good test of a team's capability. Here's how this's gonna work: I'm gonna stay in this arena for ten minutes, 'n at the end of the minutes, whoever has a bell gets to stick around on the team and whoever doesn't will go back to th' academy. You can attack me as much as you want... don't be afraid to hurt me, I can take it." He hiccuped and swayed a little unsteadily.

Kame felt he needed to speak. "But sensei, there are only two bells- does that mean one of us is guaranteed to go back to the academy?"

Deihaka shrugged. "You figure it out. Now, go!"

The instant he said the word, Haku darted so fast she was a blur, coming back up behind him and swinging out a leg. Kame froze in shock at the display of speed- he hadn't even had time to register the trial starting.

Deihaka got a hand up to block the strike from hitting his head and leaped back. "Ugh, I'm a jonin and you're a genin... what makes you think you can just-" He broke off as she charged him again. "Why're you doing this?" She didn't respond, coming at him straight with a raised fist. Deihaka boredly made the correct block with his hands as she closed the last few feet- but then she blurred again and ended up upside down, supported on her bent elbows underneath and past the block, kicking a leg straight up towards the jonin's chin. Kame leaned forward; with the power of that kick the fight could be over on the spot.

However, it stopped just short of Deihaka's chin, blocked by… something. As little flecks of metallic dust trickled down, Kame realized what it was: _The magnet release! He used it to block the strike last minute with a shield!_ Deihaka grabbed Haku's exposed leg and flung her away from him, sending her rolling to a stop. _She's slower to get up now, that must have injured or dazed her,_ Kame thought.

He decided to test out Deihaka's defenses with his newest invention and began folding in his hands. Meanwhile, Deihaka was lecturing the downed Haku. "You see... this's why you won't... you're not gonna have success as a ninja with only taijutsu. Against some enemies, it isn't enough- I don't care how strong or fast you are, your bones'll break before my iron sand does."

 _Done_. Kame raised his arm and tossed a fan of kunai at the ground below Deihaka as he talked. The jonin immediately reactively leaped up into the air, as expected. "Did you really expect a few kunai to work...? Aren't you supposed to be a tactics prodigy, why're- what?" His lecture broke off as Kame's sneakily tossed paper airplane flew towards him. He shouldn't be able to dodge in midair, so it should at least force him to bring out the iron sand.

However, Deihaka out-thought him, creating a platform of iron from thin air and pushing himself to the ground. "C'mon, I'm a jonin... gimme me at least a little respect." Kame only smiled as his plane sailed through the air past Deihaka, angling upward more and more until it was coming back the way it came, and then down at the unsuspecting target. Its loop completed, it flew straight down towards Deihaka.

At the last minute the Sand jonin's eyes flicked up and he noticed the missile, but it was too late. Kame made the correct handsign and the plane exploded mere inches from Deihaka's head. _Wait- maybe that was too far, I could have killed him…_ As the smoke cleared, however, his doubts were assuaged as he saw the ninja standing there unharmed, a shield of iron sand protecting him. Upon closer inspection, though, the tip of one of his boots was charred.

 _So he has a limited supply of the iron sand_ , thought Kame. _Maybe_ _if I hit him from enough sides, I can spread the damage enough to- yeah, that's it. I'll need some time to prepare, and I have to hope that Miriki and Haku don't beat him in that time._ He turned back and began attaching paperbombs to some twine and looping it into a kunai.

Looking back, he noticed that Miriki had disappeared, where to he didn't know. Haku was still on the ground, out of it for the moment, leaving Kame alone to face his opponent. He made sure to quickly finish up his preparations before standing and throwing the two knives at either side of Deihaka, successfully landing them into the walls of the arena. "Feel like surrendering, Deihaka-sensei? I have you surrounded with paperbombs." Deihaka's eyes narrowed as his eyes fell to the offending bombs all around him.

"So I'm guessing that you're... you think you can spread out the sand until I run out, huh?" The iron in the air around him suddenly lost form and fell to the ground, no longer moving. "The thing is, Kame, I saw your little trick earlier with the handsign..." He shook his head as if to clear his mind and then looked back towards Kame. "Now I have a way out."

"What?" Kame didn't see what he meant.

"'Cause as long as a ninja's controlling something, and that something is dangerous, you can always just…" Kame suddenly felt something brushing against his leg and looked down in horror to see that Deihaka's iron sand had stealthily made its way across the ground from the jonin's feet to his own. _Shit!_ Kame leaped backward and managed to escape the sand, but then felt a presence behind him in midair. _I should have blown the explosives when I had the chance!_

"... Take out the ninja in charge." Deihaka finished while slamming a forearm onto Kame's head. The genin was knocked back to earth, hard, and the impact was enough to take away his breath. Deihaka landed back on the earth, outside the area with the paperbombs.

Kame moved backwards and pulled out two kunai that had paperbombs attached to their hilts. Turning, he saw Deihaka resume his position in the center of the arena, cockily spinning the bells around his fingers and whistling. _Now's my chance!_ Kame fired the kunai off one after the other, and as he thought, Deihaka decided to show off and simply dodge them instead of using the sand shield.

He detonated the second one when it was a foot or so away from Deihaka's face, hoping to get lucky and score a hit. The jonin's eyes widened and the sand came up, too late, as Kame watched a wave of explosive energy envelop his teacher's face.

Deihaka cried out in pain and fell over, but didn't bleed- and Kame soon saw why, as the man's entire body slowly lost color and dissolved into sand. The real Deihaka stepped out from behind one of the wooden barricades, with a look nearing pride on his face as he looked at Kame's handiwork on his sand clone. "That was a fun little trick... nice one, but an attack, doesn't matter how strong, is wasted when you use it on an opponent's clone."

"I know that- however, how else do you think I was going to draw the real you out?" Kame challenged, pulling out another special little thing he'd created only the previous night. It was a relatively light cube of folded paper with a windbomb within (the one with a wind change of nature).

He pulled out another two kunai and tossed them at Deihaka, following them up with the cube. His aim was true, and the ball sailed straight up over the enemy. While Deihaka was busy dealing with the knives, he detonated the concussive explosive within the ball, sending the outer layer of paper out with great speed and plastering the ground all around the detonation zone.

Deihaka's eyes widened as he noticed the change and he leaped backwards while putting up a shield in front of himself, barely getting out before the field detonated, but also stepping straight into Kame's trap. Kame had intentionally detonated the ball slightly early and placed the circular zone a little bit ahead of Deihaka, leaving him with a single option; to jump out on the nearest side and make a wall with his sand.

However, what he hadn't noticed was that in that direction laid the fallen paperbomb wires outlining a medium-sized area. The fight had knocked up enough dust to obscure them, but Kame had kept their location in mind since he'd laid them down. Deihaka paused for breath, unaware of the imminent danger, and Kame laughed. A single handsign was all he needed. "Now you're mine!" He made his fingers into the detonation handsign and the sand all around his opponent erupted with fourteen separate explosions.

The smoke was intense this time, and sand rained down from the sky, scattering all around- however, there was no iron sand mixed in with it. This heralded the sight he was about to lay eyes upon, which was Deihaka somehow managing to erect a wall around himself. "Where the hell did you get enough iron sand to pull that off?" Kame muttered angrily, frustrated at being thwarted.

"I can get the iron from nearby... I don't know, metal things. You assume way too much, and it's setting you back. In fact, in... uh..." Deihaka looked at the clock on the wall- "Two minutes, it'll set you back for another year at the academy."

Kame shook his head, still in disbelief that Deihaka could utilize such an ironclad defense. _How can I beat an opponent that can make defensive walls of unbreakable metal at will?_ He looked up in desperation at the man who would have been his teacher and gasped in surprise- Haku was not only conscious, but had somehow gotten behind the man and was leaping at him from behind.

Tipped off, Deihaka slowly turned, his wall starting to collapse inward, but it was too late. Haku landed inside his defense and slammed him directly in the face with a right hook that sent him flying ten meters, bouncing twice but managing to land in a makeshift crouch. His eyes flared in annoyance and trails of metal dust came streaming in towards him from all around the arena, but Haku was faster and reached him first, swinging her other fist towards his head. He dodged just in time for her to crunch her hand into the wall, sending a few spiderwebbed cracks out at the impact location. However, even as her attack "failed," her other hand was reaching towards the bells on Deihaka's waist, only for the iron sand to arrive and start to form a defense-

But the moment it came within a short distance of Haku, it slowed and even began to fall apart, leaving her free to grab the bells and roll backwards. The defensive move proved unnecessary, because Deihaka stopped fighting the moment she'd gotten her prize. In an unexpected move, though, she turned to toss one of her bells to Kame, who nearly let it fall past him due to his surprise.

"We're..." Haku glanced at him but turned away just as quickly, seeming awkward all of a sudden. "We're even."

Before Kame could formulate an answer, Deihaka slowly stood up, stretching himself out a bit. "Well, I guess that's it then. Time's up, and Miriki isn't even-" At that exact moment, Miriki came charging in with a dinner bell clutched in his hand. Deihaka raised both eyebrows. "Miriki, what... what're you doing?"

"Well, you said 'at the end of the time whoever isn't holding a bell will go back to the academy' Deihaka-sensei, and now I'm here with a bell." Miriki smiled.

Kame started to yell at him but Deihaka beat him to it. "I meant the bells I have on me! Not some random bell that... I don't know, you probably stole from someone!"

"Hey! Firstly, I _bought_ it from a nice vendor at the market! And secondly, you should have specified, then. Because your exact words were 'whoever doesn't have a bell at the end of the time is going back to the academy!'" Miriki said with a slow smile. Deihaka frowned and seemed to have a silent staring contest with the genin, before sighing and shrugging.

"Whatever... I guess it would be a pain to have to replace you in the squad." His voice dropped into a mumble. "Damn it, now I _have_ to do this teacher thing." _Was this whole thing a convoluted attempt to get out of work?_ "But, before I pass all of you, what was the purpose of this exercise? You sorta achieved it, although I don't think it was on purpose." Deihaka looked at them owlishly.

Kame thought for a moment before realizing. "Teamwork. The purpose of the test was to see if we could work as a team together to defeat you, despite there being less bells than people."

"Right! Anyway, I guess I accept you as my students, but missions don't start until tomorrow, so… How 'bout you go over your strengths 'n weaknesses so we can all get to know each other better? Oh yeah, also tell me why you wanna be a ninja."

Miriki replied first. "Okay then. My name is Miriki Kosuki, and I am a genjutsu specialist. I am still working on unlocking my clan's kekkeigenkai. My taijutsu is poor and my ninjutsu is decent, and I primarily use the Water nature." He said the entire piece confidently and smiled the whole time. "I want to be a ninja because it's a great way to pick up girls and annoy my family at the same time."

Kame grit his teeth, restraining himself from commenting on the other boy's ridiculous statement. He looked over at Haku, who seemed unwilling to go next, and shrugged. "All right then, my name is Kame Hakiara. I plan to specialize in tactics, ninja tools, and ninjutsu. I've used wind and fire changes of nature and I'm training to unlock earth. My taijutsu is decent and I can manage to release genjutsu but I have no talent for using them. My biggest accomplishment is the specialized paperbombs that I've made, which vary in utility and destructive power. I've also shown an aptitude for puppetry and art style ninjutsu, although the paper style I'm developing is what I hope to be my strongest asset. I want to be a ninja because I've admired the greatest shinobi since I was young and hope to..." He trailed off, feeling acutely awkward at actually stating his dream out loud.

Deihaka nodded slowly. "You're... you seem like you have some good potential, Kame. I'm gonna expect a lot from you." Kame nodded and hoped that the prideful blush he felt wasn't actually visible.

Haku looked left and right, then sighed, "Hello, my name is Haku. I don't have a last name because I came here an orphaned child and have no memory from before then. I'm great at taijutsu and and have large chakra stores, but something, I don't know what, has stopped me from channeling it into ninjutsu or genjutsu. Because of that, I've been spending all of my training time focusing on my taijutsu."

Deihaka frowned. "We're gonna have to see what's holding you back. Ninjutsu and genjutsu are important to be a ninja... anyway, you all can go home early for the day."

Haku seemed to turn and start attacking some of the training dummies, making the same kick over and over. Miriki, on the other hand, walked away towards the downtown area (probably looking for more girls to woo). Kame jogged off towards the rapidly disappearing Deihaka. "Deihaka-sensei! Please wait, I'd like to speak with you!"

"What is it?" Deihaka slowed slightly and allowed Kame to catch up and slide up next to him. "What is this about, Kame?"

Kame's eyes flashed down to the bottle that the jonin was surreptitiously sliding back into his vest. _Wait, was he drunk this whole time? But..._ "Deihaka-sensei, while we fought you, I saw Haku's eyes change, and she stopped your sand jutsu. Is there something about her that she isn't telling us?" Kame didn't know of any jutsu that could turn off an opponent's jutsu that a genin would know. In addition, her speed was beyond a human level, no matter how hard she'd trained, Kame didn't think a normal person could not achieve that.

Deihaka looked away. "I… don't know anything about that. Are you sure you aren't just seeing things?" Although the words were spoken innocently, Kame's instincts were telling him that it was a lie. "Look, I need to give my report on the Genin in my squad to the Kazekage, so why don't you return home and go back to... I don't know, making more paperbombs?"

With that, the elder ninja leaped off towards the Kazekage's residence, leaving Kame alone to think. He briefly considered just walking away, but his curiosity was far too strong and he ran off after his squad leader, pulling out a small sheet of paper and small flash of chakra-infused ink.

After dipping the brush into it he channeled even more of his chakra into the brush itself, before drawing the sign for 'listen' and around it a small fly. When he arrived, he poured his intent into his drawing and then activated his art jutsu, bringing the ink to life. It peeled off the page and condensed into the shape of a small fly that immediately flew off towards the top level that he'd watched Deihaka enter. The Art style was something he'd briefly considered going more into, but as time went on he realized that due to how slow it was its users had to be able to make incredibly quick decisions. Kame was more of a slow, tactical analyzer, so he'd moved towards more adaptable techniques (while retaining his few utility Art jutsu).

Almost as an afterthought, he dropped one more paperbomb at his feet and started his wait. After a good twenty or so minutes, the fly came back out and landed on the paper. The ink it was made from seeped down and everything it had heard was transcribed right there. Kame looked down and started to read.

 _ **Deihaka**_ : Hello, Kazekage. The test went... well; all three members of squad eight passed.

 _ **Gaara**_ : Excellent. Those three in particular have the makings of incredibly powerful Shinobi. What happened with the Yorutsume clan girl? How has Haku progressed?

Kame paused. He hadn't realized that Haku had a clan- in fact, she herself had said she didn't have one. Was the village keeping a secret from them? He looked back down to see how the conversation went after that.

 _ **Deihaka**_ : She accidentally unlocked the first stage of the Yorutsume kekkeigenkai. However, she doesn't appear to have a clue about her seal or mark, so we're safe from that for the time being.

 _ **Gaara**_ : Try to keep her from manifesting either if you can.

 _ **Deihaka**_ : Yes, sir.

 _ **Gaara**_ : What about the Hakiara boy? He'd requested lessons with Kankuro, but I turned him down due to his age and lack of puppet style lineage. Do you thinks he's suited for it?

 _ **Deihaka**_ : Yes. He's a tactical prodigy and even workshops his own ninja tools. To be perfectly honest I don't think there's anyone who's more suited.

 _ **Gaara**_ **:** All right, I'll ask Kankuro to do it as soon as possible. For the time being, continue to monitor Haku.

 _ **Deihaka**_ : Of course. One more thing, though, sir. What should I do if the ten-

The paper was suddenly ripped from Kame's hands and shredded, the little pieces fluttering down to the ground. Kame gulped and slowly turned to see Deihaka himself standing there on the tree branch behind him.

"Whaddaya think you're doing, Kame?" Despite his voice slurring, Deihaka's face visibly burned with rage.

"Uhm… escaping?" Kame signed and the paperbomb at his feet detonated, exploding and spreading a large cloud of smoke. The moment it went off he leaped, but not away, just straight up. He stopped on a higher branch of the tree and cast the transformation jutsu, becoming an offshoot limb of the tree. He then sat there for five minutes, just to make sure Deihaka was gone, before dropping down and jogging off towards his home, with no sign of anyone chasing behind him.

He made his way home as quickly as he could without sprinting or drawing attention to himself, trying not to overthink his situation and scare himself. Spying on private conversations involving the Kage was a serious offense- the punishment for him could be bad. _I might get sent back to the academy... or worse!_ Kame worried more and more. _What if they decide that I'm a spy? Why did I have to go and fulfill my curiosity!?_

He finally reached his house, a medium-sized building on the edge of the town, and jogged forward up the path to the door. The only real defining feature of the two-story home was the stone shed outside the main structure which contained his workshop. From the look of the place his parents had returned. _Great, they're finally back. They've been gone for a whole week._

Kame stepped in the door and immediately regretted several decisions as he looked upon Deihaka, his father, and his mother all three standing in the living room with arms crossed. _Shit! How did he beat me home!? Did he just head straight there as soon as I dropped the smokescreen!?_ He looked up and smiled weakly. "Soo… hey there, mom, dad, welcome back home… Deihaka-sensei, fancy seeing you here…"

They just stared angrily. His dad broke the awkward silence. "Deihaka has told us what you've done. What were you thinking!? You know our family is relatively new to the Hidden Sand, why would you do such a thing and make us look like traitors!?" He was right. As newcomers to the Hidden Sand who'd only been there for three generations, his family's position was precarious still- _And what did I jeopardize it for_ , he thought, _satisfaction of my passing curiosity!?_

"I am deeply sorry for what I did. Feel free to interrogate me or do whatever you see fit to do to confirm that I am not a spy." Kame bowed deeply, almost afraid to look back up and see the judgement in the eyes of the adults.

To his surprise, instead he felt a hand on his shoulder. Deihaka helped pull him up to look him in the eyes. "'s alright. We already did some deep background checks on your whole family 'cause of your… unique situation. Plus, we had some ANBU check in from time to time. You didn't show any suspicious activity up until this point, so since you have a believable reason for spying, I'll let you off with a warning this time."

Kame started to sigh in relief but was stopped by a sudden flash of seriousness in Deihaka's features. "But if you even sneeze in a suspicious way again, I'm not gonna take you this lightly, got it?"

Kame gulped. "Yes, sir."

Deihaka smiled and sat back. "Good, good. Now, I guess since you already read our whole talk, I need to go over some rules of... uh..." he scratched his head, searching for the correct word. "-Disclosure with you." Kame kept his face calm, although his heart was racing. _He doesn't know I didn't finish reading the paper! This might be my chance to learn what I couldn't earlier_!

Deihaka sat down, motioning for Kame to do so as well. He ran through a long set of handsigns and then released a jutsu of some sort, making his hair blow a little bit and rapidly removing the flush from his face. After a few seconds, he shook his head quickly and turned to the mother and father and spoke in a much more lucid voice. "I'll have to ask you to leave the room for this conversation, as it contains sensitive village information." They complied, and judging by the jonin's response they didn't make any attempts to eavesdrop. "Well then, I suppose I should start off by telling you that you can speak of her jinchuriki nature, as well as her clan status, to absolutely no one, especially her."

Kame narrowed his eyes at the massive change in his squad leader. _He was drunk for the entire testing process?_ However, curiosity about Haku kept him from pursing that thought any further, instead driving him to consider what Deihaka had just said. As far as he knew, all of the tailed beasts currently had jinchuriki, which meant that she was something special. "She doesn't know?" He tried to keep the conversation going.

"Well, no, she doesn't. When she staggered into the village five years ago, apparently she had no memories whatsoever. I'm told that the sealing mark used upon her was something we hadn't seen before. By analyzing its nature we came to the conclusion that it sealed a part of the ten-tails' chakra within her, although it will probably never come out. However, if she were to die then it's possible that the ten-tails, or at least a part of it, would be resurrected from her body, which we can't have.

"So, we decided to keep her alive but separate from the rest of the village in case the seal ever weakened. Lord Kazekage also arranged a way for her to receive food and be taught basic lessons until she was about eleven. Although most of the village elders preached that she should be forever kept far from others, when she declared her intention to become a shinobi, lord Gaara intervened on her behalf and allowed it.

"The elders agreed, but I believe they only did it due to the fact that the seal had also completely mutilated her chakra network and ruined any chance of normal jutsu casting for her- they assumed she'd _fail the ninjutsu test and flunk out_." He said the last bit with special weight to Kame.

Kame simply sat and thought for a moment before responding. "But her taijutsu is insane. She has the potential to become truly strong- she's already exceeded the speed of anyone I've ever seen."

"The same chakra network reconstruction that took away her ninjutsu and genjutsu must have shunted it into her physical abilities. I took a quick look at her physical chart- due to all of the chakra raging around inside of her, she's been naturally focusing it into her muscles to enhance her strength." _Like the stories of Tsunade_ , Kame remembered. Deihaka seemed almost apologetic. "Honestly, I wouldn't blame you if you want to leave the squad now. There won't be any punishment, and you'll simply be placed on another team. Haku and Miriki would return to the academy for another year."

Kame thought for a moment. If he said yes and got lucky, he might be able to be with Tetsute and Rakuyo! However, as he thought further, he had a sixth sense that attracted him to the mysterious cursed purple-haired girl. As a person who prided himself on making informed, rational decisions, his mind was screaming for him to do it, but his heart told a different story. _I'm going to regret this_ , he thought as he sighed and voiced his choice. "If not me then wouldn't someone else have to bear the risk? Anyway, judging from the tales I've heard, if the ten-tails escapes then we're all in trouble. Besides, my skills complement hers. I have confidence that she and I... and Miriki," he added as an afterthought, "Can become a strong team."

Deihaka face flashed with an expression Kame couldn't read for an instant before settling into a smile. "That's... good... to hear, Kame. Now, any last questions before I go?" He stood up.

"Actually…" Kame started. "I was wondering… what exactly does her kekkeigenkai do?"

"It's complicated and we don't know much about it, but it is thought to have something to do with stealing chakra." Deihaka turned serious again. "Be sure that you don't breathe a word of either conversations you learned from tonight to anyone."

With that, the jonin took a swig from his bottle and disappeared, leaving Kame with a huge amount of information to think upon. His parents came back in and started to try and speak with him, but he was adamant on not breaking his word and kept quiet about what he and Deihaka had discussed. They relented and went to eat dinner as a family, and then he went upstairs to his room and fell asleep without tinkering at all for the first time in a while.


	3. Arc 1 Vol 3: Origin: Haku

**Shinobi Union Registry Files (Genin) (Hidden Sand):**

 **Date: 50 A4**

 **Academy Exam Graduation Data: Haku [Redacted]**

Ninjutsu: D  
\- Notes: _Despite historically failing ninjutsu assignments, manifested minimum requirements for graduation._

Genjutsu: D  
\- Notes: _Total failure to cast or dispel genjutsu until the graduation exam._

Taijutsu: A  
\- Notes: _Highly skilled, speed and strength both exceptional, passable with thrown weapons._

Appearance: _Normal height (5'6") and weight (115 lb), highly athletic build, medium-length messy purple hair. Typically clad in bandages beneath purple kunoichi top & skirt_

Attitude: _Unable to get along with majority of other students, mostly compliant with teachers but limited in ability to follow instruction. Demonstrates obvious ambition, yet submits to superiority of other students in contrast to it, suggesting underlying motivators._

History: _Arrived at Sand village in 45 A4, showing signs of_ [Redacted] _. After_ [Redacted] _, placed under_ [Redacted] _. Joined the academy in 49 A4, passed an uneventful year as a student before graduating._

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Kame awoke the next day committed to get off to a great start on missions. His parents had already woken up and gone to report in for their next assignment (as two members of sand border security they were rarely at home). He himself prepared a quick breakfast and left early, determined to check something. He did stop briefly to pick up a huge stack of paper bombs that he'd prepared over the last few months, fitting the pile neatly into a container on his belt. Reaching over, he also made sure to grab his new Sand shinobi headband, tying it neatly around his head and trying not to smirk with pride.

Trekking through silent streets in the morning cold, Kame for some reason found his thoughts drifting towards the Kazekage. Gaara had held the position for an incredibly long time, from a young age he'd reigned until now his near-eighties. Kame had always felt a healthy respect for the man, for overcoming the mistrust of the entire village and eventually even leading it through the Fourth Shinobi War. When the newly-made genin made it to the village center, he walked up to a shopkeeper named Gerin. The old man wasn't the most interesting or sane of people, but he was a reliable source of information on village social affairs. "Hey, Gerin!"

"Well, hello there, young Kame. What brings you here today?" Gerin slowly turned.

"Gerin, I was hoping that you could tell me where Haku lives?"

"Who?"

"Haku. The girl with the purple hair? She arrived here about five years ago." Kame found it hard to believe that he had no clue that she existed- then again, he hadn't known about her until roughly forty-eight hours ago, so he wasn't one to talk.

"Oh yes, her. The feral child… why are you looking for her? It's best to stay away from people like her." Gerin couldn't know about her true jinchuriki nature, so he must simply have a personal feeling about Haku. _Is this how most of the Sand villagers feel?_

"Why would I want to stay away from her?" Kame tried to keep his voice casual despite rampant curiosity.

"Well... I don't think I should... Let me just say that she's trouble. Why would you want to be near her, anyway?" While talking about Haku, Gerin's voice had entered a tone that was strangely secretive. He wouldn't meet Kame's eyes, either.

"She's my squad member and I'd like to speak with her before we start on missions. Why wouldn't I want to be around her?"

Gerin grunted and looked from side to side before dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. "A few years ago she attacked a group of other children and tried to kill them. After that, the village moved her far off onto that northern cliff," he said, pointing towards the area, "probably because she was too dangerous. She's been there ever since, I think. Can't confirm it because my old bones can't take the steep stairs to get up there but I've been told she lives alone up there." the elderly man shrugged and turned back to preparing his store to open.

Kame thanked him and jogged off towards where she should live. As he approached the wall he saw a set of carved steps, probably only two feet out from the wall and very steep. They were clearly used often but not by many people.

He forged onward and upward, making his way up the carved stone until he could see almost to the other end of the Sand. _Wow, they really were serious about separating her._ He actually started to feel bad for her, alone like this, far away from everyone else. It was like the stories of the Kazekage's childhood- why hadn't people learned from him that if they just gave others a chance, they might be surprised?

 _Well, I guess I have..._ he thought as he walked up to a border wall made of sandstone. _And so far,_ _she's shown her nature to be awkwardly shy and secretive._ _Then again, that still doesn't warrant this much isolation_. He walked up to the wall and had a moment of doubt, given that this didn't look like anyone's house, but then again it was the only structure up on the cliff, so it had to be hers.

He approached the archway to enter and noticed that it was crumbling a little with age. As he passed through the threshold, he realized why- the house was little more than a slowly degenerating ruin. Chunks of rock lay everywhere, remnants of what had probably used to be statues littering a twenty foot square courtyard that led up to a broken, squat little stone structure.

A door was set into the cliff face, so he shrugged and knocked on it, to no response. He tried again, louder, but still there was no response whatsoever. Hesitantly, he pushed against the door, opening it and stepping inside. The house itself was… well, it wasn't messy, but that was because there was almost nothing there. A few books leaned against a refrigerator, sitting next to a cabinet and a sink on the right wall. The rest of the room was dominated by her bed, empty but unmade. A cabinet with the top drawer left open held her skirts. He pulled open the second drawer and then immediately slammed it shut, unable to suppress a violent blush from spreading across his face. _What was I thinking, digging through her clothing drawers like some kind of pervert?_

 _Where is she?_ Kame thought about the available evidence inside the house; _she must have left to go…_ he walked over and looked into the refrigerator, finding it near-empty. _Ah, to the market, then!_ He turned around and made his way back down the cliff, jogging over towards the grocer's section of the city. However, he'd barely made it halfway there when he found himself turning a corner to come upon a terrible scene.

Rakuyo, Genji, and Tetsute had encircled Haku, making escape in either direction in the narrow alleyway difficult. Tetsute was actively speaking around a wide smirk, but underneath Kame could see simmering resentment. "Haku, why'd you have to go and cheat on the exam? You and I both know that a retard like you couldn't pass it. What, did you sleep with the instructor so he'd do it for you, or something?"

Haku swallowed and shook her head, eyes distraught. "I… I didn't…"

Rakuyo laughed. "No, no, no, don't try to sell me some story where you learned how to use ninjutsu one day before the test. It's way too obvious how weak you are, can't you see that? Why haven't you dropped out yet?"

Tetsute shook his head. "And now you're dragging Kame down with you. See, the way I figure it is, if you hadn't passed, then Kame might have ended up on our team, and Genji could have been with his friend Miriki. Not that you'd know anything about making friends."

Haku fell silent, her eyes softening to become more despondent than resistant and her cheeks coloring. Tetsute kept going, gleefully now. "So here's what you're gonna do. You're gonna go to Kazekage's offices. You're gonna tell them that you cheated on the test and that you want to go back to the academy. And then, you're gonna quit your stupid little team so Genji, Rakuyo and I can get proper partners for the rest of our time as ninjas. Understood?"

Haku shook her head.

Tetsute narrowed his eyes at her before his eyes widened and a grin split his face. "Oh, I see, if you admit that you cheated now, then you'll never get away with it again. And with your infant-level grasp of chakra control, you'll never pass normally- Ha!" He barked out a laugh. "You'll end up in the academy forever!"

Genji chuckled and Rakuyo contained her giggle to speak as well. "I think we'd honestly be doing the Sand village a favor… Can you imagine, being under attack by enemy ninja and then having some idiot with no ninjutsu or genjutsu show up to help!?" She joined the other two in laughter.

Tetsute's chuckling died down and then he appeared to grow more serious. "Seriously, though, you _are_ going to go turn yourself in. I don't want to leave Kame stuck having to carry you for his entire ninja career- hell, you're even putting his life at risk just by being on his team!"

Finally, he seemed to lose the facade of happiness, narrowing his eyes and growling out, "Alright, how about we play a little game. If you can break my genjutsu and escape my ninjutsu, I'll leave you alone. Sound good?" She didn't respond, but he obviously hadn't expected her to, continuing his explanation almost immediately: "But if you lose, you quit being a ninja."

Haku finally opened her mouth to respond, only to freeze as Tetsute made a series of signs in her direction, remaining still even as he transitioned to another jutsu, which rippled along the ground and softened it enough to her to slowly start sinking in. His work ostensibly done, the boy went right back to smirking and leaning back with arms crossed, watching his victim sink gradually inch by inch, all while trapped in her mind by whatever genjutsu he'd concocted.

"So, what odds do you give her this time?" He asked Rakuyo.

"Eh," Rakuyo responded with an oddly restrained humor in her expression, "Fifty-fifty."

"So high?"

"Well, no," she replied, allowing a bit more mirth to creep across her face, "Fifty percent chance she gives up and loses, fifty percent chance she keeps fighting and still loses."

Genji, who'd been quiet the whole time, finally spoke up in a cautious tone. "Guys, don't you think this is enough? We're trying to scare her off, not kill her..."

"Kill her?" Tetsute rolled his eyes. "No, I'm just gonna drop her in up to her chest and leave her. Trust me, this isn't the first time."

For some reason, at his mention of prior times doing that, Kame's mind jolted with a sense of something being wrong, but refused to give him any details. In the meantime, Haku's downwards progress suddenly halted with the earth up to her waist, prompting Rakuyo to question "What? Did you decide to go easy on her this time?"

"Not me," Tetsute responded tersely, then immediately flinched and looked up as a few grains of sand tumbled to the ground. Whatever he saw there must have terrified him to his core, because he immediately bolted, Rakuyo and Gunaji following in his wake instantly, leaving a just-now-waking Haku alone in the alley. Kame, driven by curiosity, followed the path of his old friend's gaze and froze much in the same way, looking straight up at the Kazekage, who was standing on a plane of sand that dropped him onto the dusty alley floor.

The elderly man lowered himself to stand beside Haku and, with a wave of a hand, lifted her out of the earth that she was buried in. She stood slowly, almost painfully, and grabbed a dirty bag of groceries with sand and dust spread all around within it. _Was she still going to eat that?_ Kame realized that she, as an orphan, must live off the village government's charity. _She probably can't afford to buy new food, even if the stuff she has is filthy._

The Kazekage finally spoke. "Haku, you need to defend yourself from those who treat you like garbage. You don't deserve to be beaten for simply following the path you want."

Haku just flushed slightly and looked away, unwilling to respond, and the Kazekage simply sighed and shook his head. "Go home, Haku. Train more, become strong, but most importantly- realize your own worth. People will..." He trailed off as Haku ran off, taking the other way out of the alley and back towards her home.

The imposing man then turned to look at Kame. "You there… Kame, right? Come out, I can sense your presence." Kame did as he was bid, shaking slightly at the sight of the Kazekage's face bearing nothing but disappointment for him. "You are her teammate. Why would you just watch three other ninja harm your teammate?"

Kame thought a little before responding. "They were my friends, and… well, they made some valid points. Besides, I figured that if she wanted to defend herself, she could, I've seen her-"

His superior silenced him with a new, sharper tone. "Ah, I see, so those two being your friends once makes their actions defensible? 'They had some valid points'? You're simply making excuses." Kame wanted to defend himself, but he could tell the Kazekage wasn't finished. "As for defending herself, well… Were you around, before, when she was eight or nine, a newcomer to the village? No, you wouldn't have been, your parents were insistent on maintaining your village's tradition of sheltering and training the child while they are young… Let me show you, instead."

Before Kame could object, he felt an illusory genjutsu take hold in his mind and he was thrust into a memory, unable to move or do anything other than look and hear and somehow _feel_ the situation before him.

 _Haku was only nine years old when she stumbled into the village on worn legs, wearing a tattered coat several sizes too large for her and filthy from head to toe. Ninja had ushered her to a medical center, where she'd been treated for extreme fatigue and mental trauma. Immediately after her treatments, Gaara had taken her to find out where she'd come from and what had happened._

 _The truth came out- she was a survivor, seemingly the sole survivor, of a tragedy that had wiped out her entire clan. The Yorutsume clan had been a rarity, existing completely outside of the village system, training their own and rarely contacting the outside world. They took high-level assassination requests as their only outside source of income. However, for some reason, the entire clan had been wiped from existence, apparently leaving nothing - but now, leaving Haku._

 _Gaara had established a way for her to receive enough money to live on from the village, as well as giving her a home in an apartment in the middle of it. She stayed there for a few days before finally wandering out, looking like a new person after being cleaned up and given some rest. Her eyes, having before looked dead and unhappy, now sparkled with curiosity about this new place all around her._

 _Eventually, Haku found her way to the yard where most of the other children played. The game of the day was Ninja Master, where children would take turns showing each other whatever small jutsu they'd mastered in a game of one-upping each other. She tried to participate but failed completely, which was alright- many of the other children were there as watchers, to be able to do anything with one's chakra at that age was impressive._

 _However, unlike the others, she took it very hard, looking strangely confused and terrified. Further efforts to form anything failed, and now she was the target of attention. One child told her to just stop, as she obviously wasn't strong enough to complete a jutsu; she reacted to that with an actual flinch of terror and appeared to simply try even harder on her failing attempts._

 _A few other children laughed, and the talker, edged on by his comrades, shoved her back a few steps and then cast a faulty clone jutsu of his own, managing to create a single clone- admittedly a pathetic, colorless, useless one, but still far beyond anything he should be able to. In response, Haku narrowed her eyes and seemed to try even harder, one last time-_

 _But this time, something was wrong. Rather than whatever she'd intended to do with her chakra, instead a black smoke crept from her back and her eyes filled with dark spirals that eventually filled them, turning them into matte darkness. A few other children screamed and ran, and most stayed either out of unwillingness to look scared or out of curiosity, but only one actually moved towards her: the talker from before._

 _He challenged her, but was ignored, yet his continued efforts finally drew a reaction from her; she turned and, in a strained voice, asked him what was going on. The next few instants passed by far too quickly for Kame to react in real time, yet in this strange, illusory world, he watched in great detail as Haku's arm shot out to grab the boy around the neck. Even as frightened screams erupted from several onlookers and even from Haku herself, her arm swirled with a purple chakra that pooled and then flowed out, seemingly enveloping the head of her victim and muffling his shouts of defiance. His physical struggles faded almost as quickly as his verbal ones, as his kicks grew weaker and weaker, until he hung fully limp, by which point most of the other children had fled the scene._

 _One girl charged in, probably thinking of saving her friend, but was casually batted away by one of Haku's other arms, which was armored by the same purple chakra, and sent the would-be-rescuer flying to land halfway across the play area. She did not get up._

 _When all hope seemed lost, a passing Sand ninja in a chunin vest stepped in, first with a wind jutsu that blew in and simply dissipated, and then with his bare hands, yanking the two apart even as he shouted for assistance. More shinobi arrived on the scene, and more, keeping the now-vicious and almost animalistic Haku from attacking anyone else. However, none were capable of knocking her out, so it was a good three minutes of containment that passed before a squad of four mask-wearing Sand Anbu arrived and whisked her away using several complex jutsu._

The memory cut out for a few seconds, but before Kame could give any serious thought to what he'd seen, it shot right back in to another scene:

 _The Kazekage was looking at a stack of letters on his desk with an unreadable expression on his face. When finally he opened one, it all became clear- it was a letter addressed to him, from a concerned parent who had heard about his relation to the new child in town who'd attacked and critically injured another kid. The next one had the same topic, and the next, and the next after that, and while some pleaded with him and others demanded instead, all wanted the same thing: for the danger to be kept away from their own children._

 _Hours later, the Kazekage was walking a mostly silent Haku into a building on the cliffside at the edge of the town, and explaining to her that she was not to leave it. Her food would be brought to her, and teachers would come to help her with things she needed to learn, but she couldn't ever leave without first being told that it was allowed. When finally she spoke, it was accompanied by her grabbing the bottom of his robe and and begging for him to come see her, eventually earning his promise to visit as often as he could. With those words, she released her grip, and simply watched from the stone dwelling that would be her world for the next few years._

When Kame's senses returned, he was alone in the alleyway, left to ponder his new information. He knew what would happen next, when she was finally allowed out from her isolation to join the ninja academy- Tetsute and Rakuyo would let her have it, because somewhere along the line she'd lost her ability to cast jutsu, making her easy pickings...

 _No_ , he realized, thinking about how fast and strong she was. _If she wanted to hurt them, she probably could, so... why? Why let herself get picked on?_ It only took a second or two for him to piece it together- if she did attack them, there wasn't a snowball's chance in hell that the feral child who'd mauled another kid and then been isolated for years and years would suffer no consequences for fighting two of the Sand's golden children, no matter the circumstances. Tetsute and Rakuyo probably didn't even realize that her past had taught her not to fight back, and the thought of them interpreting her submission as cowardice made his blood boil in a way he hadn't ever felt before.

In fact, when he thought of Tetsute and Rakuyo, his mind was incredibly torn- they were bullies, but from what he'd just seen they were doing it out of some kind of misguided desire to help him. _No, wait_ , he remembered, _They've been doing this for years, right?_ He wasn't the root cause of them picking on her, he was just one more incentive. The root reasons had to be more complex, and yet...

The more he thought about it, there weren't any acceptable reasons for them to do what they did. Haku was not a weak link, and he wasn't in undue trouble because of her. Thinking of the Kazekage's look of utter disappointment in him, Kame winced. _I'm not going to be like them_ , he told himself, and reached a decision: He would commit fully to the team. He would give it his all, and try to make up for his previous friends' treatment of Haku. _She deserves that much, at the very least. In fact, I'll stop looking down on her and Mir-_

Well, maybe he would still look down on Miriki.


	4. Arc 1 Vol 4: The First Mission

**Shinobi Union Registry Files (Jonin) (Hidden Sand):**

 **Date: 50 A4**

 **Jonin-Sensei Assignment Data: Deihaka Surakiri**

Ninjutsu: A  
\- Notes:Deihaka's mastery of the Magnet Release makes him difficult to match in the field of ninjutsu

Genjutsu: B  
\- Notes: Although not a specialist, his genjutsu is absolutely jonin-level

Taijutsu: B  
\- Notes: Simlar to genjutsu, highly proficient but not specialized

Appearance: Tall height (6'1"), moderate weight (145 lbs), of average build. Short and messy red hair similar to that of the Fourth Kazekage, brown eyes. Typically clad in jonin's vest over casual clothing, wears iron sand condensed into circular plate on back.

Attitude: Displays constant lack of motivation and affinity for alchohol. Lacks the composure of other ninja of his caliber, yet competes with some of the strongest while on missions, in clear dissonance with his personality.

History: After a shot career as genin unworthy of note, Deihaka remained a relatively unknown chunin for years, apparently stagnating. However, despite behavioral issues that kept him from progressing in rank for several years, was recently promoted to jonin by the Kazekage's order. Success rate on missions is evidence that his abilities are up to par, yet despite his apparent skill and noteworthy inheritance, he has stagnated once more, perhaps due to greater unknown problems.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Kame ended up arriving right around the same time as Miriki (I.E. "fashionably late") due to the majority of his morning being spent in the Kazekage's vision. When Haku, who'd been the first one to arrive, looked over at him, he couldn't help but feel a twinge of pity that he hoped didn't make to to his face. When she narrowed her eyes, he scrambled mentally to think of some excuse, but was saved by the arrival of Deihaka, through the door rather than the ceiling this time. "Greetings, genin."

Kame bowed. "Greetings, Deihaka-sensei."

Miriki, on the other hand, raised an eyebrow and said, "You're late, Deihaka-sensei."

Deihaka shook his head. "No, I'm not."

Kame's teammate just pointed at the clock on the wall. "You said to be here at eight o' clock."

"Yep," the jonin replied, supremely unimpressed, "But I made no promises about when I'd show up." Miriki seemed to be formulating a retort, but Deihaka kept going to nip it in the bud: "I know how these things work. You got here late, and I'm not waiting around for you to show up."

He talked confidently, but Kame noticed bags under the man's eyes that suggested a different origin for his tardiness. Miriki, though, did not let it go: "Why am I the one who has to wait, huh?"

This drew him disbelieving glances from both Kame and Haku, but Deihaka seemed to take it in stride. "Because I outrank you, kid." Apparently done with the conversation now, he moved on to look over all three genin before sighing. "We're going right into it. Our first mission is today, and… well, let's just say that it's not exactly first mission material." Kame started to ask what that meant, but his leader kept talking. "One of our outposts bordering the Land of Rivers missed their last report, so we're being dispatched to 'see what happened'."

Miriki was the first to reply. "Why did you say that last bit differently?"

Deihaka actually yawned, doing a surprisingly good job so far of killing Kame's excitement about his first mission. "Because this mission is more a way for the Kazekage to remind them to be more dutiful. The Land of Rivers is not a relevant military threat and would never attack one of our outposts; it's far more likely that the idiots stationed there got soft and forgot to send in a report. Now, I'm assuming you all have whatever ninja tools you need?" They all nodded. "Good. We're leaving; try to keep up." Deihaka then, without warning, disappeared out the door, followed by Haku. Miriki and Kame shared a look before following suite, trailing the jonin out of the village and off towards the border.

It only took a few hours, during which Kame had all the free time in the world to have his happy expectations gradually die away, replaced by equal parts dejectedness brought about by Deihaka's jaded analysis and worry about what might be in store for them should said jaded analysis prove wrong. By the end of their hike, though, he was leaning towards the latter feelings, as from the moment their target came into view, Kame could tell something was off. Although he'd never seen the outpost, it seemed a little too flat to the ground, while Deihaka's silence, the pillar of smoke trailing into the sky, and their sudden increase in pace told the rest of the story. As they neared, they slowed down to move more stealthily, until they could clearly see their objective.

The outpost must have once been a sandstone tower, but no more. All that was left was piled rubble scattered about the ground. Small fires burned, contributing to the tower of smoke and dust that marked the location for miles around, yet there was no sign of ninja, neither Sand Shinobi nor enemy. Still, Kame didn't drop his guard.

Deihaka held up a hand, signalling them to stop. "You all need to wait here. I'll see what the situation in there is- if it's all clear, I'll tell you, understood?" They all nodded. He stealthily crept forward, making a few handsigns, and then sank into the sand. A small raised portion was all that betrayed his presence as he made his way forward.

Kame, Miriki, and Haku all sat and stared at each other, awkwardly sitting there in complete silence for seconds stretching into minutes. Eventually, Kame took out some of his firebombs and began folding them into a design he'd come up with, completing most of the folds for a paper airplane, but leaving only the final step undone. In this state, they took up less space and were still flat so they could be stored very easily, but also were but a single quick fold away from being the weaponized airplanes. The pouch had been a gift from his parents- a enlarged version of the standard issue paperbomb container. Seals applied to the pouch itself cut the chakra stored in the paperbombs off from the outside world, which prevented them from all going off when a detonation handsign was issued. Kame had immediately asked for more, and now had three of them attached to his waist at any given point.

One done, he moved on to another, and another, and another, quickly falling into a calming pattern of folding. It was actually kind of reassuring, the repetitive- "Hey Kame! What's Rakuyo like, in person?" Miriki loudly asked, startling Kame out of his focused state.

"What kind of- no no no, don't hit on her, Tetsute will flip his-"

Miriki rolled his eyes. "Just tell me, c'mon... I've only seen her when your little friend group was all angry towards me, what's she like in private?"

That's right, we always made fun of him back at the academy, Kame remembered. I should probably feel bad, but... the fact that he was having this conversation was a microcosm of the attitude that made Miriki such an insufferable prick. The day I feel bad for holding Miriki accountable for his attitude is the day I quit being a Sand shinobi. "Stop. Trust me, you don't want to mess with her."

Miriki snorted and shook his head, "Hey, you trust me. I have yet to meet someone who can resist my charm. Besides, you looked fine just a few minutes ago, weren't you all calm and focused?"

Kame rolled his eyes. "Well, not anymore, now that you're loudly revealing our position to the entire area."

His teammate just smirked. "We've got Deihaka-sensei with us, do you really think we could be in any real danger? We're first-timers, this mission can't be that bad, can it?" He wasn't taking this even close to seriously enough.

"Look, Miriki, Deihaka-sensei was clearly expecting this to be a routine checkup where we would just give them a formal warning. That's not the case, and someone actually destroyed a base manned by three full chunin, so please have your guard up." Kame reached back for his paper.

Haku suddenly leaped forward with a raised fist, planting herself in front of Kame with her back to him. Before he could ask what she was thinking, a figure began to rise up from the sands, and he also took out a kunai. The tension broke immediately, though, when color and detail reappeared on the form of Deihaka, who was chuckling.

"You guys have the right instincts, but you can't just wait while a possible enemy rises up from the sand in front of you. Strike first, or don't strike at all." He raised an arm to put it behind his head. "Anyway, I think I've figured out what happened there, but we may as well make a learning experience out of it, so you all take a crack at it."

Kame eased up and turned to walk towards the broken building. When he arrived, several things became immediately clear. First, the destruction wasn't as bad as it had looked; several pieces of furniture were still intact and it was mostly the outer walls and roof that had been destroyed. Second, the blast that had broken the fort had been from inside it, as the walls collapsed outwards. Third, there had been a fight after the explosion, as several kunai and cuts were made on broken edges of rubble that wouldn't have been exposed before the detonation. Fourth and finally, this fight had happened recently, as the sand hadn't had time to fully settle over and around the broken fortress.

Miriki called out from the main building. "These Sand shinobi weren't leaving in a hurry, huh? This kitchen is empty, and there aren't any belongings left here, either." Kame considered that. All the evidence pointed towards an assault by some unknown enemy, which had blown apart the fortress before attacking the shinobi within it. However, the guards wouldn't have been prepared in that version of events. If they'd won the fight, they would have reported in, meaning they had to have lost. But if they'd lost, then why were their possessions and food gone? The attacking ninja probably wouldn't have wanted to drag along such things.

Kame dug around some more, but it was Haku who uncovered the next piece of the puzzle. She waved from just outside the fort, calling out, "Hey! There are some paperbombs out here, weird ones…"

He hurried over to see what she was talking about. There were indeed paper bombs, and something else- tracks, not quite masked by the shifting dust. The paper bombs, upon closer inspection, seemed to be similar to the concussive ones he'd figured out. In fact, they looked like they were designed to be even more in that direction- they'd hardly inflict any damage or force at all, just release a powerful burst of air.

Thinking it over, he realized the purpose must have been to mask their tracks- the bomb, when detonated, would have destroyed any sand-based evidence, including the time estimate he'd been able to figure out minutes earlier. Why hadn't they detonated it? Furthermore, since the bomb had remained undetonated, there should have been tracks leading out from the base as well, but there weren't any.

Could the attackers have lost? But the Sand Shinobi were nowhere to be found, so that meant that… they must have wiped each other out simultaneously? But there were no corpses or anything suggesting dead ninja. In fact, there was no blood at all.

Miriki chimed in again. "There's some marking on the ground here, I think I recognize it… yeah, that's a genjutsu that…" He leaned over, studying it intently, "Would- or, did, I guess- knock its targets out for a little while. It got set off, but that's weird, since these things take like an hour to set up."

Kame started to have a creeping suspicion, but he needed to check one more thing to confirm it. Running back into the central courtyard area, he looked at the loosely scattered ninja tools, and his theory was correct: they were all Hidden Sand issue weapons. There was zero evidence of any Hidden Valley shinobi offense, just a single undetonated paperbomb that would have covered their tracks.

He turned to Deihaka, trying to sound as confident as possible and stating, "This battle was immediately won by the Sand Shinobi, who then fled, taking the Valley Shinobi with them. I don't know why they would do that, but the evidence points to it. They destroyed their own base, then scattered kunai and other implements about to disguise it as a battle."

For a few brief seconds, Deihaka remained expressionless, but then he grinned and nodded. "I came to the same conclusion. Good work, Kame, Haku, Miriki, you all seem to have some skill, at least. Now, we have to follow this further. If the situation becomes too dangerous, I will tell you to pull out, and you will respect my orders, understood?"

They all nodded. Deihaka then slung his backpack around onto the ground and began digging around in it. "We've covered enough ground today, now we camp for the night. We can start again early tomorrow morning. I'll take first watch, then I'll wake Haku, who should watch for a few hours before waking Kame. Miriki, you're last in the order, you'll get up very early and go after Kame.

"Now, who's hungry?" He reached into his pack and removed a large bottle of sake, which he then began downing without a care in the world, only halting (with the bottle still held up in a drinking position) as he noticed his three confused-looking students. A tiny flicker of something approaching self-consciousness seemed to pass through his expression, and he lowered the bottle with a satisfied breath, next producing a meal pack from his bag and starting to dig in.

"Uh, Deihaka-sensei..." Kame began, but Miriki finished it for him.

"You forgot to tell us to bring food!"

Deihaka lowered his utensils. "You all need me to tell you to bring food?" Before Miriki could answer the rhetorical question, he kept going, "No. I didn't have to tell you to bring kunai-"

"We were supposed to bring kunai?"

That one got a snicker out of Haku, but Deihaka merely ground his teeth. "Damn it, if I let you starve I'm pretty sure it's breaking some kind of rule, right?"

"Absolutely," Miriki said with an absolute surety that set off alarm bells in Kame's mind.

"Oh!" Deihaka lit up, then turned to rummage around in his bag once again, finally producing three pellets that Kame recognized after a second or two. "Food pills," Deihaka announced triumphantly, "Here you go."

Kame felt the need to interject at this point. "Aren't those supposed to have all kinds of nasty side effects?"

"Nope," Deihaka said, before immediately backtracking. "Well, okay, maybe, but these are the ration kind, not the 'fight for three days without rest' type." Well, that's not so bad, Kame thought, reaching to take one- "Probably." Okay, not reassuring- "Maybe. Actually, how old are these things?" Deihaka said apparently to himself, scrunching his brow in confusion. "When did I... Nevermind! Eat up," he finished, smiling with the very image of sincere generosity.

Kame slowly retracted his hand. Compared to bottom-of-backpack food pills of unknown age and composition, he thought, No dinner suddenly doesn't sound so bad. Miriki and Haku both seemed to share the sentiment, because neither of them made any move for the offerings, either. Deihaka's sincere smile morphed to more of a smirk as he sat back and chuckled out, "Alright, alright, fair enough. Get some sleep while you still can."

Each of them unpacked their bedrolls and settled down for the night inside the broken building. After lying down, Kame drifted off to sleep easily and dreamlessly.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

When Kame woke up, it was from his own natural causes, not from Haku's shaking as he'd expected. Rolling over, he straightened up to see a sky pitch-black, the light of the moon the only thing preventing complete darkness. Right as he was about to try to fall back asleep, he heard movement from behind him and turned to see what it was. His eyes settled on a sitting form that had to be Haku, staring at her arm. He could barely make out a silhouette in the dim light, but she sounded to be breathing heavily. The standoff lasted for almost a minute, before she wrenched the arm back down to her side, standing up and sighing.

Kame barely remembered in time to pretend to be asleep when she stepped over to him and shook him. "Kame, it's your turn, get up." He stood, stretching his sore limbs and yawning, pretending to blink away grogginess.

He swallowed and looked around. "Okay, okay, I got it." Satisfied, Haku turned back to her bedroll and laid down, facing away from him. He sat back against the wall and brought out the paper to fold, half-paying attention to his hands and keeping a watchful eye on the surrounding area.

A few hours went by without anything noticeable happening. When he felt himself starting to slip back to sleep, a quick check of the time told him that he could swap in for Miriki. The other boy was sleeping soundly, and it took a few shakes to get him lucid. "Miriki. Your turn."

"Huh?"

It took everything Kame had to not slap him. "Miriki, you need to take your turn watching the area."

"Five more minutes…" Miriki smirked a little bit half-consciously.

Kame gave up. He lightly slapped his fellow genin across the face and barked, "Get up!" Miriki yelped and sat up quickly, blinking in confusion and pain. Finally his eyes settled on Kame, who could only glare.

"Ugh, fine." Miriki stood up and moved towards a smaller piece of rubble that he could sit on. Kame smiled and slid into his own cloth bedroll, falling asleep in minutes and losing himself once again to a dreamless void.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

When Kame awoke, he found himself staring at four new shinobi. Scrambling and nearly ripping his bedroll in confusion, he finally managed to dart backwards and draw a kunai. Eyeing the newcomers warily, he took stock of the situation: They were still at the rubble of the Sand outpost. Haku was still asleep, Deihaka was standing off to the side, and Miriki was…

Miriki was talking calmly to them. Kame lightened up a little bit, straightening up and stalking forward to where the conversation was taking place. When he heard what they were talking about, he felt himself blush and mentally swore to get Miriki back later.

"Tell me, are all the girls from the Village Hidden in the Valleys as beautiful as you are? They don't make 'em like you in the Sand…" He grinned at one of their kunoichi, who giggled and blushed, hiding behind her fingers but still staring at him.

Kame fully straightened and looked at the newcomers. It was clearly a team of Hidden Valley genin and their jonin kunoichi leader. Two of the genin looked similar, maybe twins, a boy and girl with the same sandy-brown hair and light blue eyes. The remaining genin, the girl Miriki was hitting on, was a shorter one with blonde hair and brown eyes. All three seemed fairly inexperienced and antsy.

The jonin was another story. Taller than even Deihaka, she had a massive kama strapped to her back, whose haft was as tall as Kame was. Although she wore a normal jonin's vest, underneath was a chainmail coat. Most intimidating was the way she stood, with the easy confidence of someone who knew they could kill everything within twenty meters.

Miriki kept up the flirting. "You know, I sense something between us- a special connection. After I mop up whoever did this, you want to go to dinner?" Again, the girl giggled and blushed. He started to push his advantage, but was interrupted.

Deihaka strode forward towards their jonin. "Enough of this, Miriki."

The woman nodded towards her own charge. "Keikiro." The girl immediately backed away towards the other two Valley Genin, leaving the adults to stand facing each other in the central area. Deihaka first broke the silence. "So, we've given you our interpretation of what happened here."

The other jonin nodded. "Yes, you have."

Miriki called out, "Do you babes think you could give us your names in exchange?"

Deihaka whipped around and stared daggers at the Kosuki boy, but their Valley counterparts seemed to take it well. The jonin pointed first at herself, saying "Senshiko", then at the blonde, "Keikiro", then at the male twin, "Gunaji", and the female, "Sagino". Deihaka replied with all of team 8's names (with a noticeable pause and sigh before Miriki's).

Senshiko frowned as she turned back to Deihaka, lowering her hand from her weapon but not dropping it fully to her side. "Yes, you've given us a report on your interpretation of events. But how am I to know that you didn't just capture my allies and escape with them? All the evidence you've listed supports that theory as well."

"No it doesn't." Kame felt compelled to speak up. "If we were the ones who did it, why would we do all of this? We could have simply pretended that we knew nothing. Destroying an outpost and setting up all this, just to divert blame onto some people who were originally from our village, is just plain foolish."

Gunaji tilted his head a little, staring at him intently, while the others considered his words. Senshiko pondered for a few moments, then grunted. "Fine. However, you will come along with us as we hunt down these supposed 'traitors'. Keikiro's clan specializes in tracking, and I'm confident that she can lead us to them."

Deihaka nodded. "Agreed, I also-" but he was talked over.

"Not so fast, I wasn't finished. If and when we catch your ex-comrades, they will be given straight to us for interrogation, understood? No tricks, no scapegoats, the ones who did this will be punished." Senshiko's eyes hardened.

Deihaka was far more hesitant to agree to that one, but after visibly wrestling with the decision for a few seconds, he sighed. "Fine. You keep the prisoners."

Senshiko nodded, gesturing at the Keikiro girl to come forward. "We need to give her a moment to pick up the trail." With that, the two teams finally broke their standoff, moving forward to mingle. Sagino, the girl twin, winced a little bit when hopping down from her rock, and Miriki was on her instantly.

"Hey, Sagino, having a little trouble? Let me help you, eh..?"

She looked away from him. "No, just a little sore from the long walk here."

Miriki grinned at that. "Oh? I could have sworn it was from running through my dreams all night…" She smiled at him, and they walked off still talking.

Kame caught a glimpse of the brother and flinched a little. He looked enraged, fists clenched at his sides and eyes locked in frustration on Miriki's back. In other words, someone who I can relate with, Kame thought, approaching him while waving to get his attention. When he finally ripped his eyes off of Miriki, they lost their anger and he even smiled at Kame. "Hello, Sand Shi- I mean, Kame, wasn't it…?" He awkwardly put a hand behind his head. "So, I guess we're gonna be teaming up, huh?"

Kame nodded. "Yeah. Did you know the patrol that got taken?"

Gunaji shook his head. "No, but… I mean, does it matter? They're shinobi from my village that are in trouble; I have to help them."

Kame held up his hands in attempted pacification. "No, no, I didn't mean it like that… It's just, I wanted to know if they were strong, to get a good judge of what we're going to be up against, you know?"

The other boy nodded. "Yeah, I get it. I… don't know how strong they are. Senshiko-sensei wouldn't tell us much about them, but I get the impression that they weren't all that powerful. Then again, they were three chunin-rank ninja, so honestly I can't say."

"Then I guess we'll have to just proceed carefully until we're sure what we're dealing with," Kame replied. Very carefully, he thought. Situations like this were extremely dangerous; he never liked to walk into things not knowing what he was up against.

Right then, a voice rang out from the other side of the temple. "I've got something!" It was Keikiro; she must have found something that she could track. Their eight-person group convened around her. "That genjutsu was pretty distinctive, and I got a reliable trail off of it," she said, before taking off towards the North.

Senshiko followed suite, calling back "Keikiro's tracking follows a chakra trail, but it consumes the chakra in the process- we have to go now, or else we'll lose them!" The others all grabbed what they had to and caught up quickly, so, shrugging, Kame took off after them.


	5. Arc 1 Vol 5: Attack on the Lair

**Shinobi Union Registry (Jonin) (Hidden Valley):**

 **Date: 50 A4**

 **Jonin-Sensei Assignment Data: Senshiko Nagakura**

Ninjutsu: B  
\- Notes: _Jonin-tier, otherwise unremarkable_

Genjutsu: B  
\- Notes: _Jonin-tier, otherwise unremarkable_

Taijutsu: A  
\- Notes: _Special use of Kama and addition of clan moonlight techniques earn her A-rank_

Appearance: _Very tall height (6'3"), moderate weight (180 lb), highly athletic build. Silver hair and eyes typical to clan, usually clad in silver body armor with large Kama strapped to back._

Attitude: _Absolutely loyal to village, ruthlessly efficient, but also known to go beyond bounds of missions in order to "deliver justice", possibly a trend within clan._

History: _Heir to Nagakura clan, mastered their techniques at a young enough age to be considered a genius. Achieved rank genin at age 10 and rank jonin at age 17, proves her combat skills on every mission she has been sent upon._

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

It was midday when the hunters finally stopped traveling. As they stopped to rest in a heavily wooded area, Kame wondered why- had they reached their targets, or had the trail gone cold? As the genin caught their breath, he noticed the two jonin split off to have a private conversation. His first instinct was to listen in, but then he remembered what had happened the last time he'd tried that.

Instead, he decided to approach Gunaji, who was sitting off to the side and beating on a stone with another implement. Trying to mask his confusion at what the other boy was doing, he called out, "Hey, Gunaji." The Valley genin nodded at him. "What… are you doing?"

Gunaji looked down at the rocks in his hand, then back at Kame. Suddenly, realization seemed to dawn over his face and he smiled, raising both hands to show their contents. "My clan, the Kokuseki, use a specific kind of earth style jutsu. It… well, I don't want to give you all of my secrets, but it gets significantly stronger with sharper rocks.

"I recently found out that this specific kind of stone will shatter like glass when broken, which allows it to achieve levels of sharpness that cannot be achieved otherwise." Kame looked at the raised hands. Inside of the right one was a black, glassy rock with chips missing, and in the other one was actually a battered piece of steel that might have once been a kunai.

Kame smiled. _He's an inventor, too_ , he thought, happy to have found a kindred spirit. He decided to sit down beside Gunaji, pulling out a piece of practice paper and trying different folds to see if anything would occur to him. They sat in calm silence for a good four or five minutes, until the jonin finished their discussion and called for the attention of their charges.

"Okay, you all, listen up. We are now going forward into what could very well be enemy territory," Deihaka said. "Therefore, me and Senshiko will make up the front, with Kame and Gunaji bringing up the rear. The rest of you will keep within that formation and follow our orders. Remember, you may be genin but this is the real world, and any mistake could cost you your lives."

Senshiko detached her kama from her back and turned towards the direction they'd been traveling before the stop. "We're going." Kame rose up, pocketing the paper and trying to clear his mind in preparation for what lay ahead. He watched as the other students each rose and made their way into the formation described by their leaders.

Then they started, and Kame had to focus completely on what surrounded him. The trees of the forest were dense, and he had to carefully scan every inch for movement to be sure that nobody was hiding in them. It was a difficult task, and not for the first time in his life he wished he had some sort of visual kekkeigenkai to aid him.

Suddenly, their group stopped. Kame allowed his eyes to drift forward to what lay before them, which was a cavern, fortified with a huge iron door that covered it completely. The jonin were stopped in front of it, and he saw Deihaka reach forward, presumably to attempt the magnet release. However, nothing happened.

Kame decided to step forward, reaching into his pocket. _As long as they're made of steel_ , he thought, _I should be able to break them with a controlled blast_ -

Then he heard a kunai whistle past his head. The next few seconds were a blur of motion as their group split, turning to face the enemy behind them, while Kame silently cursed himself for letting himself get distracted micro-managing the jonins' tasks. A loud hiss cut through the noise, and he looked down in horror to see that the thrown knife had a paperbomb attached to it. He tried to dodge backward but knew in the back of his head that he wouldn't make it, when suddenly an impact of iron sand against his chest threw him backwards barely a split second before he felt the second impact of the blast.

Instead of crashing against the ground, he met with a softer crash against a human- Haku had caught him. She then dumped him on the ground and darted to the side, leaving him with a statement that shook him from his stupor- "Kame, pull your weight!"

 _She's right_ , he thought as he straightened up and got back on his feet. _I was picked to make up the rear guard because of my talent, and now I'm just being useless._ He refocused on the situation, taking everything he could. There were at least two enemy ninja in the treeline surrounding the clearing they were in. The door remained sealed, but everyone besides Deihaka had bolted from the exposed open.

A cry sounded out from the treeline, and then a large patch of leaves exploded to reveal a ninja dressed all in green, impaled on the end of Senshiko's kama. The polished steel blade of her weapon was now glowing with pure white light. She withdrew the weapon in one smooth movement, dumping the corpse of the green-clad ninja onto the ground, then leaped down beside it and decapitated it to make sure the job was done.

Meanwhile, Haku was dodging a few shuriken coming from a larger tree, from which also flew a barrage of projectiles directed at Deihaka. Deihaka made a shield from his iron sand, blocking the attack, and then something strange happened- the projectiles rose up from the ground to fly straight back where they'd emerged, although no cry of pain heralded a successful hit.

Miriki, Gunaji, Keikiro, and Sagino all held positions around the treeline, scanning for an opening but focusing mostly on defense and dodging. Kame took in a deep breath before forming his plan. He then yanked a folded piece of paper from a pouch, finished a final fold, and in one smooth motion flung it towards Haku and Deihaka's assailants' tree. Without even pausing, he threw two more at the ground underneath it and readied two kunai knives.

The first plane he detonated immediately as it entered the tree, and it exploded in a spray of napalm. The wood quickly caught fire, and right on queue, two forms fell from the branches, right onto his settled second set of airplanes. Another handsign detonated those, forcing the two enemy ninja to dodge upwards into the air, and then he unleashed his finisher, flinging both kunai at their targets. In the air, mid-dodge, they'd never be able to avoid the sharp blades.

However, he realized his miscalculation when the kunai met only wood. _A substitution jutsu!_ Kame was annoyed at failing to plan for one of the basic three jutsu. _Of course they would know it; how the hell could I expect them not to!?_ A yell sounded out from just over his head, and then a green ninja flew by and landed painfully on the forest floor, followed immediately by Haku. She slammed an arm into the man's head, hard enough to make Kame wince, and then moved on as he collapsed unconscious.

That was most likely one of the two from earlier. That left one more that he knew of, although… Gunaji and Keikiro both deflected shuriken, confirming his suspicions that there were indeed more ninja who'd simply remained hidden. His total of known ninja was reduced back down to one, however, when a shrieking figure launched out of a tree and out into the open air. Before they could fall, Senshiko leaped out and swung her kama around in an arc that glowed with silver. "Moonlight Strike!" The elder kunoichi landed easily, followed by the two halves of her target.

Kame realized that, despite the initial ambush, his allies had the situation under control. He turned his thoughts back to the gate holding them out of the base and most likely covering their enemies' retreat. _If the magnet release didn't work, then there's probably some sort of chakra nullification effect in play_ , he thought, considering his options carefully. Still, that shouldn't prevent him from using paperbombs, as by the time they exploded all of the chakra had been converted into pure energy.

He reached into his pack as he darted towards the iron doors, pulling out some normal paper bombs (the sort he used to make the planes was better for folding than attaching). He plastered an area in the middle of the left gate, making sure to aim the blasts inward and shaping them so that they would form a controlled zone of destruction. After pressing twelve of them onto the door, forming a rough archway, he backed away.

After a cursory check to ensure that no allies were too close, he signed, and a massive boom accompanied by a deceptively small burst of smoke shook the clearing. For the briefest moment, there was pause in the combat as the participants reoriented themselves to the new situation, and then Senshiko's kama cut a branch and dropped a green-clad shinobi directly in front of her on the ground.

After she gutted that one, Kame relaxed slightly- every enemy shinobi who'd attacked was accounted for. Haku had gotten one, Senshiko had gotten three, and the remaining one had been taken out by Deihaka. The new hole in their gate was jagged but wide enough for them to get in through, although through it Kame could only see darkness. Entering through that with no clue what was behind it was a terrible plan- unfortunately, he didn't have a better one.

Senshiko nodded at him, which gave him a little surge of pride- to be recognized, no, to be _praised_ by a jonin-level ninja was very satisfyng. She raised her kama, shouting "Radiant Moonlight Jutsu!" and the weapon's crescent-moon blade instantly began to shine too brightly to even look at. Light in hand, she then charged directly through the hole and into the enemy stronghold. When no sound but her echoing footsteps came from the entrance, Sagino and Gunaji both ran in. Kame started towards it as well, seeing Haku doing the same.

Deihaka stopped Keikiro and Miriki before they could enter. "You two are to stay out here and watch for any other enemies. If you're attacked from the trees and can't win the fight, enter the base and find us. If enemies come from within the base or we don't come back out within an hour, you will have to go back to the Hidden Sand and give a full report, understood?" They both nodded, eyes flickering to each other briefly. _Why those two?_ Kame thought. _If they're left together they'll pay more attention to each other than to their jobs._

However, he couldn't very well just challenge Deihaka's orders right then and there, so he just shrugged and entered the base behind Haku. Inside, by the dim light from the hole and the much brighter light from Senshiko's sword, he was able to make out some detail. The inside of the cave was rough, unhewn stone, with only the floor being flattened somewhat. Crates of ninja tools and other items lined the walls, stacked haphazardly and some even spilling out onto the ground.

More ominous were the occasional bloodstains splattered around the place. As they continued at a rapid pace down the long passage and deeper into the cave, there started to be less crates and more normal items and possessions. Clearly someone here had cleared out in a hurry, leaving behind half-eaten food and still-burning torches. After what felt like a kilometer of passage, they finally reached a wide-open space that seemed like an arena, a large circular area with gateways in the walls. Senshiko motioned for them to stop, then pointed at herself and at the open forward path. _I'll go ahead alone_.

Kame dropped back and calmed his nerves. He paid close attention to what happened next- Senshiko was walking into a probable trap in order to clear the way for their group. As she strode forward in a defensive stance, loud clacking sounded out from somewhere he couldn't see, and then everything happened incredibly quickly. A massive form charged at her, body moving so fast it was almost a blur, while another one dropped from above. She yelled out something indiscernible, and a flash of light so bright it felt searing to his exposed skin blasted out from her.

As he blinked the bright lights from his eyes and tried to refocus on the events unfolding within the arena, the situation gradually grew clear to him. Deihaka, who had somehow avoided being blinded by the initial blast, was now standing inside the arena beside Senshiko. Arrayed around them were three… demons was the only word he could think of. Humanoid in shape, but with grossly mutated bodies, they must have emerged from the arena gates.

One, the massive one, was at least three meters tall and thicker than any person. It had dark grey skin, the horns of a bull, and huge hooves instead of feet. Another hovered overhead, thin beyond malnourishment, with sticklike limbs and compound eyes covering too much of its face. Twin wings beat faster than he could track with his eyes to keep it in the air. The third one was a normal height, but with thick limbs and dark reddish fur covering its entire body. Huge claws poked out of the ends of its arms, and eyes glowed red from beneath the fur on its head.

Despite their monstrous forms, there were still torn rags that might have once been clothes on them. Their eyes twitched around, taking in the situation with more than animal intelligence. _What the hell are these things?_ Kame spared a glance around and saw the broken gates and even more bloodstains littering the strangely arena-like area. _What is this place?_

He noticed Haku striding forward and decided to follow along, keeping his eyes on the the three monsters in case they tried another attack. For long moments all the ninja in the room remained still, and then the short beast broke it by diving down into the ground with some sort of tunneling jutsu. Senshiko cried out and charged forward, swinging the kama forward at the horned foe, while Deihaka released a barrage of iron sand projectiles at the flying one.

Kame drew a kunai and quietly planned as best as he could. With more allies than enemies locked in close quarters combat like this, paperbombs would be a poor idea. His best bet was probably to wait for openings to get in some projectile weapons-

A split-second instinct was all that warned him to dodge forwards, but it was barely enough to save his life. As he rolled and came back up into a crouch, he saw that behind him stood three chunin in the Hidden Sand's uniform. Deihaka, upon seeing them, yelled at him: "Get back, now! Kame, do not fight them, leave them to me!"

Kame obeyed, backing up and remaining defensive. One of them, probably the leader, spoke in a loud voice to someone that Kame couldn't see, up above them. "Sankuryu, you idiot, they _all_ got through your outer defenses?" He pulled out a kunai. "Oh well, looks like I get to deal with them all myself. Lucky me…" He trailed off, glancing around the battlefield at the combat still happening. "Wow, you guys brought two whole teams? Two S-rank jonin? I feel real special, guys!"

Kame swallowed. Despite the man's obnoxious talking, the situation was still deadly serious. With three more enemies to deal with, their numbers were now even- but three chunin and three monsters probably had the advantage over four genin and two jonin. _Can we really hope to win and all survive this?_ The man's face brightened up a bit as he apparently realized something."Hey, wait a second… two S-rank jonin? That makes us an S-rank mission!"

 _What is he talking about? Is he seriously thinking about that in the middle of a battle!?_ While Kame was still processing those words, a shuriken whipped forward from the chunin's hand. Kame barely had time to dodge it, but while dodging, one of the other two ninja was already upon him, kunai coming straight at his neck. _Shit!_ Kame thought, _I don't have time to dodge it!_ He had to use his last line of defense, then. Making a sign in his right hand, he detonated the Windbomb hidden underneath his genin vest.

To say it felt like he'd been kicked in the chest would be an understatement. In reality, the paperbomb went off and he simply went flying as though he'd been shot from a cannon. The other ninja was flung back, not as hard, and slammed into the far wall, while Kame hit the ground, _very_ hard, and rolled to a stop. He tried to get up, but there was overwhelming pain from his chest- he might have broken a rib.

 _At least I'm still alive_ , he thought, grimacing and forcing himself to his feet. He was now on the other side of the fight from the sand chunin, watching as Haku dodged their attacks and gradually managed to get closer and closer to them in between evasive moves. However, he saw something on the earth in front of her and managed to yell out "Haku! Your feet!" before his voice disappeared into pained coughing. He'd definitely broken a rib.

She looked down and at the last second seemed to understand his warning. When the mole creature punched up through the ground and swiped at her, she was prepared for it and dodged under its claw, then grabbed it by the arm and flipped it over her shoulder towards the gathered Sand Chunin. They managed to dodge the monster, but then one yelled in pain as a black projectile punched into his leg. Kame turned to see Gunaji throwing two more of his black stones into the air, then appearing to concentrate as they flew forwards towards the already-injured target.

Kame formulated a quick plan based on how the three Sand chunin were grouping up constantly. Although it gave them strength as a united team, it also gave him an idea, but he'd have to swallow his pain to get it done. As he darted off, rounding the arena perimeter on his way back to the archway that they'd entered through, his focus drifted back towards the fight. Sagino was using some sort of jutsu that apparently hardened her skin, as she appeared to made completely of stone as she ran forwards to engage the chunin. Gunaji was keeping up his assault with the sharpened rocks, preventing them from focusing on his sister. Deihaka was trading even with the flying buglike demon, dodging and having his attacks dodged equally.

Senshiko was a different story, though, as her kama was making short work of the horned creature. Large it may have been, but her strikes were chipping away at its defense and it didn't even have any real openings to attack. The mole-like digging creature punched out of the earth beside the kunoichi, but before it could land a hit Haku came flying from a few meters away and pounded a fist into it hard enough to launch it a good ten meters and crunch it into the far wall.

Then Kame was at his destination, and he walked back into the passageway (carefully trying not to put any more stress on his shattered rib) until he found what he was looking for. _There it is,_ he thought as he charged over to stop beside a shattered crate lid. Lifting it up, he reached into his pouch and began plastering it with paperbombs. Once he'd covered it well enough, he turned back towards the fight.

The situation had worsened in his absence. Deihaka and Senshiko's respective opponents had swapped, leaving Senshiko outranged and Deihaka outmuscled. The mole was being more careful with its emergences, and actually caught Haku with a sweeping strike the next time it popped up. Kame knew that if he was going to act, he had to act now. With a yell, he ran straight at the grouped chunin, defiantly pulling a kunai and sprinting at them. Their leader turned to face him and Kame could actually see the man's thought process through his expressions: ' _What the- oh, it's one of the genin, thinking they can charge in like a hero. What an idiot_.'

Kame actually made it almost directly to them before one of them flicked a shuriken towards his face. With a smirk, he waited until it was almost upon him, reaching out to the piece of wood with his chakra and…

"Substitution!" he swapped places with it, now standing outside the arena's entrance. One more handsign remotely activated all of the paperbombs on the wood, and a few anguished cries of pain told him all he needed to know about what had happened. Limping now due to his pain, he saw that they'd all three been taken out in the blast, but two of them (impressively) had survived it. When the leader shifted and groaned, Kame stumbled back a step- _How is he still conscious!?_ The man started to sit up, but then another figure appeared behind him, a taller ninja in dark green robes and wearing a thick green rope tied around his waist. The newcomer swung a hand around and, in a single smooth movement, decapitated their own ally.

Kame froze in horror as the figure then went and did the same to the other two before straightening up and yawning, turning to face the Valley and Sand forces. Their face was hidden by a mask of a snarling Oni demon, but their voice was in line with neither their appearance nor their actions. In a calm, almost soothing tone, the man spoke out across the battle, his words somehow penetrating through everything else. "I'm going to ask you once to lie down and die. I'm not a fan of lord Orochimaru's penchant for turning everything into an experiment, so I'm offering you one chance for a clean death."

Gunaji scoffed. "You really expect us to just roll over and die? Plus, thanks for telling us who you're working for without even being interrogated."

The man sighed. "So, experimentation it is, then. Taking people alive is such a burden… but I bear it for you happily, my lord Orochimaru." He started to walk forward, hands still empty and without any visible defense. "As for you knowing who was in charge of this place, well," he chuckled. "All of you will either die right here or during experimentation in the coming months."

Deihaka stepped forward from their group. "Back off, all genin. This is one of Orochimaru's strongest known disciples, Sankuryu the Unstoppable. He's far above your skills." He turned and Kame could immediately tell from his expression how deadly serious this situation was. "Deal with the mutated ones, and leave this man to me and Senshiko."

Sankuryu laughed a little bit. "Do you really think you can save them? You never should have brought those children into this place, Deihaka of the Iron Sand. And you…" He looked at Senshiko. "I know your abilities all too well, Senshiko of the Hidden Valley."

In response, she just leveled her kama at him, striding forward to stand beside Deihaka. Then Kame had to rip his eyes from the standoff to pay attention to his own fight as the ground beside him shuddered. He leaped to the side, but made sure to drop a paperbomb on the ground where he'd stood. When the mole creature predictably appeared, he detonated it, drawing a screech of rage from the creature. By the time that the smoke cleared, Gunaji was already there, all three of his rock shards punching forward into the demon's flesh.

Haku yelled from across the room, "Can someone take this flying thing on?" _Crap, that's right, she doesn't really have any ranged options_ , Kame thought as he turned his attention to it. He tossed a few kunai to keep it dodging while he made his way across the room, also taking a moment to take stock of the other fights. Deihaka and Senshiko appeared to be more than holding their own against Sankuryu, although they did seem to be dodging rather than blocking all of his strikes.

He rapidly threw together two paper airplanes and launched them forward. The fly creature must have had some sixth sense, because it dodged them as though it knew what they did. Thankfully, he still had a good fifty more sheets of paper bombs. He didn't let up on his barrage, allowing Haku to move over and attack the bull with Sagino.

Five more airplanes were all dodged with ease, and the creature was actually managing to close the distance between them. Eyeing its disproportionately long fingers and claws, Kame decided that it would be a very poor idea to allow it into melee range. When he threw another airplane, he noticed it start its dodge immediately when he released the plane, and smiled. His trap was complete.

Kame rapidly drew another piece of paper, but this time _unfolded_ two steps and replaced them with new creases. He backed away a few painful steps, took aim, and launched it when his enemy was only about five meters away from him. As expected, comfortable in the pattern of his previous attacks, the fly buzzed upward to dodge over it. However, this plane was different- instead of flying straight like the others, he'd folded it to angle up.

The fly creature had only half a second to realize its mistake before he detonated the plane and blasted its body halfway across the cavern. It didn't make any attempt to get up, so Kame looked over at the other fights. Haku and Sagino had managed to beat down the bull, and in a final devastating flurry took it down for good. The mole, which had never recovered from his trap earlier, fell to Gunaji's focused piercing attacks, leaving Sankuryu as the only enemy alive.

Then Kame made the mistake of relaxing and stopping to reduce stress on his injured rib, and once again his laziness proved costly. Deihaka and Senshiko must have made a mistake, because suddenly Sankuryu was upon him, one flattened hand swinging around in an arc. Deihaka yelled "Dodge!" desperately, and Kame did all he _could_ do, letting himself fall backwards and downwards.

As a result, the attack that might have opened his stomach merely grazed his chest- but something was wrong. Where his attacker's fingertips had merely brushed, the vest and shirt were torn open, along with a large gash in his chest. His rib screaming, he felt himself start to pass out, fighting against it with all he had. The best he could do was remain conscious, however, and he toppled to the stone cavern floor.

Sankuryu's other arm arced downwards towards him, and he knew that this time he wouldn't be able to dodge. He also knew that no one was nearby enough to help him- _Is this really how it ends? My first mission as a genin!?_ He closed his eyes, uselessly raising an arm in defense…

Then there was a flash, and he opened his eyes to see Haku standing over him, crackling with electricity and with a fist still raised from her punch. Sankuryu had been flung backwards by her attack, and landed without taking his eyes off of them. Haku crackled a little more, and then flashed straight over to him and landed another strike, this time directly to the face, which staggered him backwards. Sankuryu narrowed his eyes and then sighed.

"You're not what you appear to be, are you? I'll have to speak to master Orochimaru about this. Don't worry, though, I'll find you all again soon enough." His hands quickly ran through a set of signs and then he disappeared into thin air, leaving the gathered Valley and Sand ninja alone in the stronghold. _Huh, we actually did… it…_ Kame thought, just as the pain from his chest and rib grew too strong and he blacked out completely.


	6. Arc 1 Vol 6: Hollow Victory

**Shinobi Union Registry (Genin) (Hidden Valley):**

 **Date: 50 A4**

 **Academy Graduation Exam Data: Keikiro Torakku**

Ninjutsu: B  
\- Notes: _Lightning change of nature, excellent chakra control, clan tracking jutsu_

Genjutsu: B  
\- Notes: _Highly perceptive, able to spot and release genjutsu with ease, capable of most minor genjutsu as well_

Taijutsu: C  
\- Notes: _Passable skills, but physical limitations put her at a disadvantage_

Appearance: _Short height (4'6"), low weight (85 lb), thin build. Light blonde hair and brown eyes, typically wearing brightly colored clothing (preference for pink)._

Attitude: _Apparently enthusiastic about becoming a ninja, but also seemingly averse to violence. Amicable relations with all classmates, but on friendly terms with most. Obedient to teachers, followed orders well, but doesn't go above and beyond unless pressured to._

History: _Rumored to have joined academy only due to influence from clan, but behavior doesn't indicate unwillingness to serve as a ninja. Graduated near top of class in everything except taijutsu._

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Kame blinked his way back into the waking world, wincing a little as sunlight blazed into his eyes. When he tried to raise an arm to shield himself from it, a bolt of pain shot through him and then he remembered- he'd been hurt in that last fight. Looking down, he saw that someone had bandaged up his chest. His attention was taken away from his own misery, though, by another realization- Haku had saved his life, and had used some sort of lightning style technique.

On that note, Miriki was suddenly crouching in front of him. "Hey, sleeping beauty, what's up? You feeling any better?" Kame gritted his teeth and slowly tilted his head forward. "I hear you broke the ol' rib, huh?" Miriki patted Kame's chest and he gasped in pain.

"Get away from me," Kame hissed.

"Hey, hey, no need to be all hostile," Miriki chuckled, "just because you got taken out on your first mission. I'm sure that you'll do better next time. Not everyone can get out without a scratch like yours truly."

"You didn't even- Agh!" Kame flinched again. So yelling _was_ out of the question. "-go into the base, you moron."

"I avoided a dangerous situation and let the grunts deal with it. That's called tactical intelligence, my friend." Miriki's smirk spread even wider, and Kame was very close to doing something he'd regret. However, Gunaji walked over and took Miriki by the shoulder, winking at Kame before dragging off his annoying teammate. Kame made a mental note to thank him for that later.

Kame, with a bit of trial and error, managed to get up without hurting himself. If he stood favoring his left side, then the right rib's pain was kept to a minimum. _I have no clue what they did to that cut on my chest,_ he thought, _but it feels like it's barely there now._ A cursory inspection of his surrounding revealed that they were back in the sheltered area where they'd stopped pre-attack, and only Gunaji, Miriki, Keikiro, and Sagino were in sight.

That changed as Deihaka, Senshiko, and Haku walked around a large stone into view, with Haku looking more happy than he'd seen her. When she saw him, her expression changed to worry and she jogged over to him. "Are you… doing okay? You're standing now."

Kame nodded. "Yeah. Umm…" He trailed off awkwardly, not quite sure how to say what he wanted to. "Haku, I… thank you. For saving my life. I don't know how I can repay you for that." He felt himself start to blush slightly and looked away from her, desperate to change the subject. "Anyway, I saw you use some sort of lightning jutsu back there? What was that about?"

Haku's face went from strangely almost sad to excited in an instant. "I got a lightning change of nature! You know how my chakra network is all… well…" She quieted a little bit. "Well, when I focused super hard on speed and getting over there instantly, it somehow opened up a lightning release inside of me. Because of the chakra network, it… well, I guess it just gives me more speed and makes my attacks shock people."

Kame's head spun. _Does this mean she'll be able to use other changes of nature? This is almost like a stance-based taijutsu technique, where she can swap between elements to give her different strengths._ He shook himself out of his thoughts to smile back at her. "That's great, Haku. I mean, it saved my life, so I'm kind of biased, but still…"

She laughed a little bit at that, but their conversation was cut off when Deihaka approached them. "Kame, you're up, good. Tell me, can you travel?"

"Yes." He could probably manage a decent pace, even with the injuries, if he made sure not to put weight on them.

"Good. We're returning to the Hidden Sand today; the mission is over."

Kame was still confused about something. "But wait, Deihaka-sensei. What about the missing Valley ninja? Weren't we also supposed to find them?"

Sagino walked up and answered. "We did. While you were downed, we went through the place. It looks like some sort of preliminary laboratory of Orochimaru's, where they tested and prepped people before they were sent to another facility, although we got nothing on the location of that one. There was also a logbook, which told us everything we needed to know.

"Apparently they'd started offering a reward for kidnapped ninja and civilians, which _your_ Sand chunin were providing for them regularly. The whole reason our patrol was captured in the first place was the string of suspicious disappearances in our villages near the border. Then, they upped the ante and offered the traitors high-level positions in their organization in exchange for three chunin-level Hidden Valley ninja.

"You know what happened next. Our people went in to investigate them, got captured, and were taken to this place. However, what nobody knew was that they were tested on almost immediately. Those three beasts that we fought in there? Those were once Valley shinobi." Sagino sounded bitter, and Kame could only hope that she would hold it against Orochimaru, rather than the Hidden Sand.

Deihaka frowned and chimed in. "It's troubling to see three ninja weaponized and made loyal so quickly. Orochimaru… well, he's always had a way with drawing strong but troubled ninja to his cause, but it's usually through corruption or manipulation over months rather than jutsu."

"Like Sasuke." Naruto Uzumaki, Gaara, and Sasuke Uchiha were the three ninja that Kame had researched most thoroughly. In his opinion, they were the three strongest ninja of the modern age, as well as excellent examples of overcoming hardship to achieve greatness. "Orochimaru, is he truly so much of a threat? I haven't heard much about him relevant to our village…"

Deihaka chuckled a little bit. "That's because they don't want to tell you the miserable truth. Orochimaru singlehandedly defeated the third Kazekage in mortal combat, then assumed his role and led us into a disastrous war with the Hidden Leaf. No one speaks of it because it's too embarrassing to admit that one man nearly brought two of the Five Great villages to their knees, but it's the truth."

Kame grew annoyed. A pet peeve of his was when people would rather cover up their errors than learn from them. _Turns out the entire village is like that,_ he thought. Before their conversation could go any further, Senshiko yelled, "Valley genin! Pack up, we're leaving!"

Deihaka shrugged and waited for Miriki to come over to their little group. "Okay, that's all three of you. We're heading back to the Sand now, but first I want to grade you."

"What?" Miriki and him said it at the same time, but while Miriki's tone was bemused, Kame's was all horror. Would this performance go down on his record as a ninja forever?

Deihaka grinned- Kame's chagrin must have been written all over his face. "No, no, this isn't anything formal, I just want to tell you how you did." Turning towards Miriki, he said, "Miriki: you did exactly what you were assigned to do without any error whatsoever. A-Plus." Then towards Haku, "You also held your own impressively well in there. A few of the hits you took could have been avoided with more careful fighting, though… I give you an A." Finally, he looked at Kame. "You made several errors both in and out of the fortress, two of which probably would have killed you without intervention from teammates. You're going to have to get a lot more careful, and stop overreaching mentally. C-Minus."

Kame really, _really_ wanted to scream at him about how he'd helped a thousand times more than Miriki had, and had the hardest jobs, but instead he swallowed his pride and anger, simply nodding. "Yes, Deihaka-sensei." The jonin smiled and then pointed towards the west.

"Good, then let's head out."

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

It took them longer to return, mostly because of Kame's weakened state, but eventually they made it. The sun was setting, and after they all made their goodbyes Kame made a beeline straight for his house. His parents had already left for their next round on the border, leaving him alone (but also leaving him a plate of sushi in their refrigerator). After chowing down on dinner, he started to head off to bed but before he could there was a knock at the door.

Opening it, Kame found himself staring at two Sand ANBU members, both standing seemingly casually but also noticeably holding weapons at their sides. They appeared to take stock of him, then the one on the right spoke in a harsh, authoritative voice: "Kame Hakiara. You are to accompany us to the detention center, we need to ask you a few questions."

Kame subconsciously backed away a few steps, but stopped when the speaker raised their knife. "Any attempt to flee or fight will be treated as capital treason. If you have any protests, you can voice them once we have taken you in." He had little choice but to follow them, feeling incredibly exposed and embarrassed in his Shukaku the Onetail pajamas. As he left, he realized that he had none of his weapons or ninja tools with him.

The detention center was set into the cliffs surrounding the city, deep inside through several tunnels dimly lit by flickering fluorescent ceiling lights. Finally they reached a security gate of some sort, where a non-ANBU security officer disabled a chakra wall to allow them deeper. Once through the door, they immediately took him to into a holding cell and gestured for him to sit down on a metal chair in front of a table.

A few minutes of painful silence passed before a newcomer came in to sit across from him, shuffling through a few files before dropping them onto the table and looking straight at him. It was a woman, probably middle-aged, but with a hard face and piercing eyes. She wore the grey-collared vest of a Hidden Sand interior defense shinobi- was this an interrogation? _Do they think I'm a spy!?_ His thoughts raced, theories multiplying by the second. _Is this because of when I listened in on the Kazekage? Maybe they're curious about the outpost mission? Deihaka-sensei told me I was off the hook for spying on that conversation; did something change!? What if-_

"Suspect! Hello?" A crabby voice yanked him from his mind and back into the cold room. The woman was still staring at him. "If you don't respond, I'm going to have to make you respond." _Oh, shit-_ she'd been talking to him!

"Yes, yes, I'm sorry. What is it you want to know? I'm happy to comply with your investigation!" Kame utterly failed to hide his nervousness, his voice even cracking slightly at the very end of his sputtered response.

The woman exchanged a glance with one of the ANBU before looking back at him. "Ugh, it's a squealer. Stop whimpering, as long as you answer everything honestly you won't be tortured… probably." She then made a few handsigns, still talking. "Due to several recent and not-so-recent events, you are under suspicion as a spy. This genjutsu will force you to answer honestly to all of my questions. If you make any attempt to release it, we will resort to good old-fashioned torture." She looked way too interested in that outcome.

Kame swallowed and tried his best to not stutter in his answer. "I'll do it- I mean, I'm-" Something strange happened- before he could say 'I'm happy to do it', his throat closed up. The woman must have finished her genjutsu already, preventing him from lying about how much he _didn't_ want to be there.

She shrugged, disappointedly saying, "Fine, if you want to be no fun at all and do it willingly, go right ahead. Now: Have you ever made contact with shinobi of another village and not reported it?"

Kame gritted his teeth, the Valley ninja he'd just met fit that description. "Yes, but-"

He was cut off. "Have you ever acted against the rules of the Hidden Sand village?"

"Grk-" _What? When have I ever tried to sabotage the Hidden Sand?_ Then realization dawned over him- _The academy graduation! I cheated to help Haku…_ "Yes, I have."

The woman narrowed her eyes. "Have you ever gathered Hidden Sand information that you were not supposed to have access to?"

"I… Yes." When he'd eavesdropped on Gaara's conversation.

The woman now seemed highly suspicious. "Did you share this information with _anyone_ not affiliated with the Hidden Sand?"

Kame sighed in relief. "No, I didn't."

"Have you ever performed any actions with the intent of negatively affecting the Village Hidden in the Sand?"

"No."

She grunted, reading something off of the paper underneath her, before asking him another question. "Have you ever, through action or inaction, brought or allowed harm to one of your comrades when you could have prevented it?"

 _Haku in the alleyway._ "Yes."

The woman sighed and shrugged once more. "One final question. Do you place the people of the Village Hidden in the Sand highest in your priorities? Would you give yours and anyone else's lives for them?"

Kame tried to say yes, but once again his throat closed. Suddenly, all he could see in his mind was Tetsute and Rakuyo beating Haku, adults and children shunning her since childhood. He thought of the three chunin who abandoned their posts and kidnapped innocents, of the stories he'd heard about Gaara and Sasori's childhoods, and finally he reached his decision. "No."

He heard the two ANBU members shift behind him, and the woman raised an eyebrow. "Who do you really work for? Who are you loyal to?"

"The Kazekage." It was true.

"Why would you say that you do not care about the people of the Hidden Sand?" She seemed more confused than angry or suspicious.

"Because they have done terrible things, and I know other people who have more moral strength than any of them." Kame was reeling a little bit at these revelations within his head- He'd always prided himself on his loyalty and moral compass, but it seemed that those two didn't work together any more. _I wonder which one the great shinobi choose,_ he thought. _Village, or morality? Or do they never have to choose?_

Suddenly, the door to the room opened and Deihaka was standing there. "Naziru, what are you doing?"

She turned to face him with the faintest trace of a smile on her lips. "Interrogating a fugitive, of course. What does it look like?"

"It looks like you just seized one of my students and brought him in here for a pointless interrogation." Deihaka crossed his arms. "The village already thoroughly vetted every member of his family, and he's clean."

"I don't know, Deihaka of the _Iron Hand_ , it seems to me like you're picking favorites here. This Sand shinobi is from a clan new to the village, already has a registered event of espionage on his record, and honestly told me that he doesn't care about the people of the Hidden Sand." At her use of the Iron Hand name, Deihaka grimaced- was it an inside insult?

His squad leader simply shook his head. "I don't care what you think it looks like, I'm pulling rank. You will release Kame into my custody immediately."

The woman laughed a little bit at that. "Haven't you heard, Deihaka? Genku was just murdered in cold blood inside of the Kazekage's office. We're now in a state of full security lockdown, which means _I_ outrank _you_." She straightened her papers and stood suddenly. "Don't worry, he's not convicted… yet… so he can return to his home under ANBU guard."

Deihaka gritted his teeth but cleared out of the way to let them ANBU agents escort Kame out of the compound. They followed him to his house, stopping outside and delivering a short warning: "We'll be watching you constantly until this situation resolves. If you attempt to flee, we will hunt you down."

Kame had a difficult time getting to sleep that night.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

The next morning started poorly as well. He woke up to the sound of cooking food, and after throwing on his clothes and grabbing his weapons, he walked down the stairs to find Deihaka in his kitchen throwing together a breakfast.

"What are you doing in my home, Deihaka-sensei!?" Kame was horrified at this invasion of his privacy, but a small-yet-undeniable part of him was glad to have someone on his side around during this crisis.

Deihaka dodged the question, grinning at him as he dished out the breakfast onto two plates on the table. "Ah, Kame, you're finally awake! Eat up, because we've got a long day ahead of us…" _What the hell does that mean?_ Kame thought, and as if he could read thoughts Deihaka spoke again. "I spoke to the Kazekage yesterday, and he said that he can't just pardon you, so in order to clear your name we'll have to actually solve the crime." The casual way he said it briefly made Kame forget the ridiculousness of his statement.

However, the illusion lasted only a moment. "What!? The ANBU couldn't solve it, and you think that you and I can?" Deihaka nodded. "I… do you understand that…" He took a deep breath to calm himself before formulating the rest of his response. "If I am seen messing around with or near the crime scene, then I'm definitely going to be convicted."

Deihaka appeared to consider that. "You're right… Damn, you're right. Still, I'm not going to let Naziru have her way, especially not after... nevermind. So, what do you think we should do?" He gestured towards the window out into the yard. "There's two ANBU out there, which means you're still on the hit list."

Kame sighed. "I'm not going to do anything. I know I'm not guilty, so obviously my name will be cleared by itself after they catch the one who actually is."

Deihaka looked at him like _he_ was the one with an insane plan. "Your plan is to sit here and wait for the ANBU agents to just leave on their own?"

"No, my plan is to go to my puppet lesson with Kankuro. With all due respect, sensei, I think you're letting your strange rivalry with that interior defense woman get in the way of your common sense." Kame bowed to his superior before stepping out the door. "Thanks for the food, Deihaka-sensei."

The walk to his puppet lessons was a short one, and despite looking he couldn't notice the ANBU agents following him. Not that he should be able to; if a genin could detect them then they shouldn't have ever gotten to that rank. When he approached the Hidden Sand Armory, the door guard looked at him, and then at a paper in his hands. Kame grimaced, fully expecting to be turned away, but to his surprise the man just waved him inwards and opened the door.

Once inside, he followed the instructions on hs acceptance letter to find his way to a smaller room deep within the armory. Behind the door hung row after row of puppets, as well as little parts of puppets and scattered cloth and wood littering the floor. In the back, he caught sight of a man sitting in a chair and looking straight at him. "...Kankuro-san? Is that you?"

"Yes. Come over here… Kame, right? That is your name? I sure hope you're skilled enough to succeed me." _Well, that got very serious very quickly,_ thought Kame. Kankuro turned on a light and was revealed to be an elderly man wearing purple face-paint a black cloak, with a bored expression plastered all over his face. "Well? Are you going to reply, or…?"

"Oh! Sorry, Kankuro-san," Kame replied hastily, "I hope- no, I _think_ I can succeed in that task."

Kankuro appeared unimpressed. "Really? You're a fresh genin, what makes you think that you should or can inherit the Sand's puppet techniques? You don't even have any history or lineage of puppet jutsu- will you just, what, make a puppet from scratch and reinvent the art?" He gestured towards the puppets lining the walls of the room.

"Well, I am highly skilled at…" _No, that's the wrong way to go about this,_ Kame thought. _There are definitely more talented shinobi out there._ What made him different? He thought for a few moments before settling on his answer. "You didn't have any of those things." Kankuro's expression remained unchanged, but Kame still forged ahead. "You didn't make Crow, Black Ant, or Salamander. Sasori, the greatest puppet master, laid the foundations for you with his creations and lives on through them. Now, you'll pass on the secrets that you've mastered and live on in the techniques you taught. It's the way of the puppet style and what makes it special." It was also what made it appeal so much to Kame- the idea of using the exact same techniques and tools as legendary ninja from the Hidden Sand's history gave him an undeniable rush.

Finally, Kankuro smiled. _He knew that,_ Kame realized, _but he wanted to see if I did as well. It was a test all along, wasn't it?_ The jonin nodded at him: "You understand it, don't you? _Real_ understanding of that is something I don't see in many people who want to be my students. They think, 'wow, look, he used death spikes and poison!' or 'oh wow, he gets to sit back far away from the fight and make some piece of wood do all the work for him.'

"Nobody sees the true point of the puppet style- except you, apparently. Yes, you'll do fine."

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The sun was setting by the time the puppet lessons finished. Kame exited the building satisfied in the progress he'd made. A quick glance around found no ANBU agents within vision- at this point, it was more a personal quest to catch one of them than any true expectation to succeed. When he started walking, though, someone did enter his field of vision.

"Deihaka-sensei!" Kame called out to his squad leader.

The jonin turned to see him and smiled tiredly. "Kame! I've got some good news, they've narrowed down the list of suspects and you're no longer on it!" _That's a relief._ "I guess my plan wasn't necessary after all, huh?"

Kame wisely chose not to respond to that, instead changing the subject to something more comfortable. "So, Haku finally found a way to use her chakra…"

Deihaka nodded. "Yeah. We practiced with it a little bit this morning, and it seems that the element she has the most affinity for is lightning. She did very well in our last mission… speaking of which, I feel like I was a little bit too hard on you this morning." Kame opened his mouth to protest that he was totally fine, but Deihaka went on anyway. "You did do more than your fair share, combat-wise, and at the end of the day you were at least partially responsible for taking out three Sand chunin, two cursemarked Valley chunin, and for getting us into the enemy base.

"You also probably feel like I'm being unfairly kind to Miriki." Kame nodded mutely, split between enjoying the praise and dreading what Deihaka would say next. "The simple fact of the matter is, Miriki is a ninja because he finds it fun, and to spite his family. You, however, aim for the highest ranks of ninja society. Do you think our lord Kazekage gets upset when he sees a genin receive high praise?"

"No, but-" Kame had to speak up. It wasn't a fair comparison- _I'm in the same boat as Miriki, not in charge of him_.

Deihaka's grin faded a little bit, sternness overtaking his face and voice. "Stop making excuses." _That's the same thing the Kazekage said to me,_ thought Kame. "You have high aspirations, and therefore I am going to do my best to get you where you want to go. Miriki will not benefit from harsh criticism because he has little desire to improve; you have much to gain from it because you truly want to grow stronger.

"Besides, at his level, Miriki doesn't have the genjutsu or taijutsu necessary to protect himself against real enemies, which is why I stationed him outside. Is that what you wanted to hear?" _It actually is,_ thought Kame. _He shouldn't get cut slack for being weak when he doesn't try his hardest._ Suddenly, Deihaka put a hand on his shoulder and looked him dead in the eyes. "Do you know what kind of people thrive on hearing others are weaker than them? More importantly, do _you_ want to be that kind of person?"

With that, his teacher walked away, although those words- and the accusations of him grabbing at excuses- haunted Kame for the rest of the night.


	7. Arc 1 Vol 7: Kodoku

**Shinobi Union Registry (Genin) (Hidden Sand):**

 **Date: 50 A4**

 **Academy Graduation Exam Data: Tetsute Hasagi**

Ninjutsu: A  
\- Notes: _Excellent grasp of earth jutsu, capable of using techniques of chunin-level complexity_

Genjutsu: B  
\- Notes: _Able to cast and dispel at a solid genin level_

Taijutsu: B  
\- Notes: _Physically fast and strong, decent grasp of martial technique_

Appearance: _Tall height (5'10"), moderate weight (150 lb), highly athletic build. Short-cut brown hair and brown eyes, typically wears standard-issue athletic garb with muted colors underneath genin vest._

Attitude: _Ambition drives him to look down on other students, but his superiority in most areas allows him to get away with it. Able to befriend and work with other top students. Treats teachers with an acceptable level of deference and follows orders to a satisfactory degree._

History: _After clan [Redacted]. Grew up as a civilian, but sought out ninja training of his own free will and tested into academy. Started even with other ninja children but quickly pushed ahead due to his dedication to self-improvement, graduated along with two others at the top of his class._

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Miriki was late. Again. Kame, Haku, and Deihaka had been waiting for fifteen minutes since the agreed-upon meeting time, standing on the practice field with absolutely nothing to do. Kame tried to occupy himself mentally but he'd forgotten his paper at home, leaving him with very little to do but stew in rage at his teammate. Finally, Deihaka broke the silence: "I wrote up a full report on our mission."

Kame nodded, although internally he wished that his sensei had finished the task before he'd had to admit to not reporting a mission during yesterday's interrogation. "Did anything new surface?"

"Nothing new; although I feel like that Sagino girl didn't fill you all the way in yesterday."

Now Kame was interested. "What didn't she tell me?"

"Well, it's less an issue of what she told you and more how she phrased it. That wasn't a lair of Orochimaru's; in fact I doubt the man ever even set foot in there. Even Sankuryu being there is a bit of bad luck more than anything. That pit was little more than a recruitment center, a middle point where captured civilians and shinobi were prepared or purchased and then shipped off to the actual bases. Those three Valley shinobi were only converted there because they knew we were coming and decided to try out a quicker-acting cursemark.

"However, like I thought, they fell way too easily to be fully cursemarked shinobi. The faster marks may well actually make their subjects weaker by taking away their minds and granting them only minor physical boosts." Kame felt a little bit less proud of outfoxing the flying-type enemy. "Sankuryu was there to oversee the evacuation of the base, and I guess also to execute the Sand shinobi loose ends. Speaking of which, Kame, you got a good taste of his jutsu, right?"

Kame nodded. "Yes. But, what is it? Barely one hit and he laid me out flat."

"His ability is documented fairly well; he was once a Hidden Stone shinobi before Orochimaru got to him. He mastered an incredibly difficult lost jutsu that gave him his title, 'the unstoppable'. This jutsu makes his movements completely unalterable- and I mean completely. That's why he went right through your vest, shirt, and skin like it was nothing- if his strike is on course to hit you, there's little that you can do but try to dodge." Deihaka glanced at Haku. "Or, hit him before he hits you.

"Senshiko and I barely held him off, and one little slip-up nearly killed you, Kame. The man's extremely dangerous, although like most taijutsu specialists he's weak at range and against large numbers or genjutsu. If you're one-on-one, though, general orders for most jonin or lower rank shinobi are to run away. To be completely honest, Senshiko is the only reason we were able even hold against him- her Moonlight Blade technique warmed up her Kama enough that the heat was enough to ward off Sankuryu's attacks…" Kame noticed that when his jonin spoke about the Valley ninja, his eyes glazed over slightly. _I_ _s there something there? A relationship that didn't get brought up?_

His focus was broken when Deihaka changed subject abruptly. "By the way, Kame, I'm surprised that you were able to hold it together. Those were Valley shinobi we were working with to save more Valley shinobi. I'm actually impressed that you made it through the whole mission without bringing up the history of your villages."

Kame frowned. "What? What history? The Sand and Valley villages don't have anything worth mentioning in terms of historical encounters."

Deihaka's eyes widened. "Wait… so you seriously don't know about it at all?"

Now Kame was starting to get angry. "No! What is it? What are you talking about!?"

Deihaka let out a long breath. "Your ancestors, they were from the Heat Devil Village, right?" Kame nodded. "Well, you know how that village fell, right?"

"Yeah, the Hidden Leaf fought a long war with them… Wait, how _did_ they fall?" Kame hadn't learned very much about his ancestral home. He'd been raised as a Hidden Sand shinobi, and to focus on the past village that neither he nor his parents had ever been to would only reaffirm the beliefs of the Hidden Sand members who thought they didn't belong. Kame remembered briefly looking up the Heat Devil village in a history book and finding something on the Hidden Leaf.

Deihaka shook his head. "I don't think I should… Eh, whatever. The Hidden Leaf might have fought your village, but the war was ultimately inconsequential. Both sides fought to a bitter standstill and eventually the villages agreed to a ceasefire." _What?_ Kame was confused now. _If the Leaf didn't destroy it, then who-_ "Then, in the ashes of the war, as your village recuperated, the Village Hidden in the Valleys took their opportunity to completely wipe out a rival lesser village. There were no recorded- wait, no, there was one survivor, but he died a few decades afterward."

 _He's talking about Genno the Trap Master_. The famous Heat Devil ninja was one of Kame's idols, a man from the Hakiara clan who, without kekkeigenkai or Biju, managed to achieve notoriety across the shinobi world. There was a confusing report of more recent actions that he may have taken in the Hidden Leaf, but Konohagakure ninja had blotted out all details. Kame may have told himself and Deihaka and anyone else who would listen that he cared about no village other than the Hidden Sand, but it was at least in part a lie- When he thought about the Heat Devil village, he felt a sort of pride and connection that he chalked up to simple love for his ancestral home.

However, the news that the Hidden Valley village had destroyed it was surprisingly… lackluster. The more Kame thought about it, the more he realized that he simply didn't care enough about it to get angry at anyone. His great-grandparents' village had been destroyed; but they had already left midway through the war with the Leaf in search of a more peaceful home. The Hidden Valley ninja he'd met had been mostly nice as well as impressively skilled, and he wasn't about to ruin his relationship with them for the sake of their ancestors' sins against his ancestors.

Finally, he gathered himself and looked back at Deihaka, preparing a response, but froze instead as he looked over his sensei's shoulder towards the arena gate. The guy walking through it was clad in a white cloak that only one person he knew would be caught dead wearing. _God damn it_ , Kame thought, all traces of the previous conversation wiped from his mind as sheer annoyance flooded through him.

"Alright, I'm here, Deihaka-sensei." Miriki had the sheer nerve to walk up like he was the one being inconvenienced. "You know, sensei, if you want to schedule any more of these sudden, last-minute lessons, can you warn me in advance? I'm standing up a lovely girl right now."

Deihaka rolled his eyes. "Missing one date isn't the end of the world, Miriki. And anyway, this wasn't a last-minute scheduling! I told you all about it two days ago while we were returning from our mission, and reminded you about it this morning."

Miriki sighed. "Deihaka-sensei, you have to make sure that I'm paying attention when you tell me things." Kame couldn't believe what he was hearing. Had Miriki somehow managed to blame Deihaka for his own inattentiveness?

Deihaka just sighed. "I don't care enough about this conversation to fight you on this anymore. You're here now, so I'm starting the lesson. Now, team eight: during our last mission, I noticed something. Anyone want to take a guess at what it was? I'll give you a hint, it was something that out of all of you, was only used once."

Kame knew the answer, he'd thought about it himself. "Besides my substitution, none of us used any ninjutsu whatsoever. Well, Haku did use a lightning stance, but outside of that nobody used any complex ninjutsu of any sort."

"Correct." Deihaka looked a little bit disappointed as he thought about it. "When I heard you say that you'd achieved two changes of nature at your age, I was very excited about your prospects; but after seeing you in action I'm not so convinced. If you haven't mastered any non-basic ninjutsu or genjutsu, then why would you talk about nature changes?"

"Well, sensei, I have mastered several ninjutsu!" Kame was indignant.

"Like what?"

Kame thought about it. "Let's see… the clone jutsu, the transformation jutsu, the illusion jutsu... uhm… the substitution jutsu... the…" _I really am pathetic_ , Kame thought. _Seriously!? That's four jutsu! Do I really only know those four academy-level techniques?_ He considered the other half of Deihaka's earlier question. "The reason I picked up changes in nature so early is for paperbomb creation- I discovered that when loading them with chakra, if I used wind or fire release chakra, I could change the effects of their detonation..."

Deihaka, as if sensing his distress, patted him on the shoulder. "Don't be hard on yourself about the jutsu thing… although you'll have to learn more of them, at least you understand the basics- I mean..." He trailed off, glancing at Haku awkwardly, before trying to resume what he'd been saying. "Anyway, the reason most ninja use ninjutsu is to achieve destructive power that you just can't get with taijutsu, but your unique focus on paperbombs has filled that hole for you. Therefore, I think you should focus on tactical ninjutsu in order to supplement your fighting style."

He turned to Miriki and Haku. "However, for you two, I'm going to do my damnedest to teach you some more basic offensive ninjutsu. Miriki, I know you want to focus on your genjutsu, but even if you incapacitate opponents, you need a finisher to put them down while you can. And Haku, your taijutsu may be excellent, but when grossly outnumbered, or when an enemy has a way to prevent you from closing the gap and getting to them, you need a way to fight back."

Then he smiled, gesturing to the three tall wooden posts sticking up from the sand. "This is a pretty standard exercise for teaching high-level chakra control, which is the first step to mastering jutsu of any type. You three are going to climb up these posts, but you cannot use your hands." As he spoke, he approached the posts and then walked straight up one of them. "The trick to this exercise is to push chakra through the soles of your feet, and maintain a steady flow of it."

He leaped backwards off of the post and back to the earth, then turned and gestured towards the posts. "Well? Let's get to it!"

Kame walked up to the post and considered it briefly. The trick here should be to use chakra to bind his feet to the wood of the pole. Briefly centering himself, he focused in on the chakra running through his body and gently urged it towards his feet, feeling it pool there, and then strode forward. A small rush of accomplishment entered his mind when it worked, first one foot then the other planting and remaining locked onto the wood. He made it a good seven or eight feet up the wooden post before a small gust of wind distracted him just enough to dislodge his feet.

After landing awkwardly on his back, Kame gritted his teeth and tried again. This time, he closed off his mind to anything but the wood beneath his feet and himself, ignoring any wind or noise that would break his concentration. Step by step he made his way upward until he reached the end, then he swung himself around to sit atop the pole, finally allowing himself to glance downwards at the others of his team.

Miriki was also making progress, wobbly but still managing to make his way upwards. However, at about a third of the way up the 45 foot climb, something happened to make him lose grip and fall to the ground.

Haku, on the other hand, wasn't managing anything at all. Kame watched as she closed her eyes in focus, but instead of the sand around her feet swirling inwards as it should if she was managing to make her chakra bind, it merely shook in place. Deihaka glanced her way, but instead of trying anything with her he walked up to Miriki and had a quiet talk with him. Miriki nodded and then tried again to climb the post, closing his eyes and walking far more steadily this time.

Whatever Deihaka-sensei had told him to do must have been worked, because he made it all the way to the top in his next attempt, albeit more slowly than Kame had. Deihaka beckoned them to come back down, and they both hopped back down, using the poles to slow themselves just enough to avoid getting hurt upon landing. "Okay, great, now that you've all…" He trailed off, looking at Haku.

She looked back at him for a few long seconds before sighing and turning towards the gate out of the practice arena. "I… I think I'm just… I'm heading home." She walked away without anyone saying anything further.

After she'd left, Kame found his voice. "Deihaka-sensei, why would you invite her to this if you knew that she wouldn't be able to do it!?"

When Deihaka turned to face him, he was surprised by the look of bitterness his sensei held. "As opposed to what? Calling you two here and not inviting her? Or telling her expressly not to come?"

Kame wouldn't back down. "It's better than having her come here just to remind her that she's crippled!"

"Is it? Why don't you just teach her, then..." Deihaka trailed off painfully. When he spoke again, his tone was more defeated than aggressive. "When I agreed to be a genin squad leader, I didn't know I'd be teaching her. I'm not a taijutsu expert, I don't know what…"

Miriki, clearly wanting a way out of this awkward situation, broke the silence. "Can we get on with jutsu training, please?"

Deihaka nodded. "Yes. Yes! Anyway, I have Wind and Earth affinity, but I've also learned the water release, so I know a few jutsu for each of you. Kame, I want you to learn the Gale Force Jutsu, which creates a massive outward blast of wind directly in front of you. That should help you with both disengaging from attacks and speeding up your own paper airplanes. Miriki, I want you to learn the Water Prison Jutsu. It's a very strong technique that can hold most ninja and should serve as that finisher I was talking about."

He walked up to Kame first. "The Gale Force Jutsu is a simple one to cast, but much harder to control. To do it, you need to complete a wind change of nature, and then focus all of your chakra on a point without actually allowing any of it out of your body. After a sufficient level of power is achieved, you release it, and all of the wind chakra will condense and subsequently expand on that point, pushing you and anything else around it away with extreme speed."

He raised a hand in front of him, and after a few seconds of concentration, a blast of wind knocked him and Kame backwards away from where his hand had been. _How about a little warning next time?_ Kame thought as he stood up. His rib was still a little bit sore, but it had been mostly healed by the medical ninja after he'd returned to Sunagakure. Deihaka was oblivious to what he'd done, grinning at him. "See? First, I want you to practice simply gathering the chakra and changing its nature without letting it escape- releasing will come naturally afterwards."

Kame nodded. Focusing in on his chakra network and on the space around his hand, he pushed his chakra towards the points on his palm. However, as the chakra quickly built up he failed to maintain control and a small burst of power came forward, laughably weak. _So the trick really is in building it up to a reasonable level._ He tried again, this time forcibly restraining the chakra and building it up more and more, until…

Damn. He pushed it back too much, and this time it snapped back into his body and resumed normal circulation. _I haven't even started on the Wind change of nature yet, this is going to take a lot of practice._ He tried again, and again, and again, each time failing, but also getting closer and closer to the correct technique. On his twentieth attempt, he finally managed it; building up the chakra enough to get a real store of power and then let it all out before him, unleashing a visible burst of blue chakra energy.

 _Wait, I have a lesson with Kankuro later today,_ Kame thought. _I'd better finish learning this jutsu by then. In that case, time for the wind change of nature…_

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

"Okay, now send the signal," Kankuro ordered.

Kame grunted and tried to do as he was told, sending a pulse along his chakra thread across the five-foot-gap between him and the puppet arm. Struggling to maintain control when the pulse of his energy reached the disjointed arm, he tried to recreate what Kankuro had described, _activating_ the metal he sensed within the wood. His efforts were met with a tiny 'snik' noise and a small point of metal poking itself from the forearm of his puppet's arm.

Kankuro nodded. "Good, that's progress." He reset the blade back into the arm and turned back to Kame. "Now, again!" Another pulse, and this time Kame used the same sort of chakra control he'd had to focus in on (during his earlier training) to force the blade forward. Despite the resistance, Kame simply pushed harder mentally- _I won't be beaten by this stupid little piece of iron!_ In one final shove, he gave a little too much chakra and keeled over onto his knees, breathing heavily, but satisfied with the sight of a full blade emerged from the arm.

However, Kankuro wasn't pleased. "You did it." His voice wasn't supportive any longer, now holding in it a tinge of annoyance. "Now what?" Kame wasn't sure what he was being asked… "You used up all of your chakra in that push- the point of puppet jutsu isn't to manhandle the puppet around with sheer force of will. You're supposed to work _with_ the puppet and use it like you would use an arm or leg."

Kame felt his face color a little bit. His momentary success now seemed to trivial compared to Kankuro's disappointment. "I'm sorry, master… I see now."

Kankuro waved him off. "Bah, whatever. You've used up too much chakra now, so no more lessons. Take the rest of the day off, but when you come back, I expect you to have more restraint." As Kame stepped out the door, his last glimpse of Kankuro was of the man turning back around to tinker with the severed puppet arm, looking more sad or bored than angry. _Maybe these lessons are as fun for him as they are for me?_ Kame thought, although that was a fairly egotistical thing to think.

As if he knew what Kame was thinking, Kankuro looked up and resumed his glare, maintaining the anger in his expression until Kame was out of sight.

When Kame stepped out the door of the Hidden Sand Armory, he couldn't help but feel happy despite being booted out of his class. _Things are starting to look up,_ he thought, and although the start had been a little bit rough, he was starting to enjoy life as a shinobi. Because (for some stupid reason) Haku was still on the suspects list, their squad wouldn't be allowed out of the village on missions until this whole spy situation blew over. Honestly, though, it wasn't half as bad as Kame thought it would be. With Deihaka's elemental jutsu and Kankuro's puppet jutsu lessons to fill his time, boredom would likely be a thing of the past.

Kankuro was a much better teacher than his first impression had made him out to be. His grasp both of the Puppet style and of the difficulties of learning it made him an excellent instructor, and although he could be harsh, for the most part Kame was finding his puppetry lessons to be very informative. Deihaka was… less excellent, although that may be attributable to him having to micro-manage Miriki constantly. _Honestly, Deihaka-sensei seems like he'd rather not even be handling a genin team, so why is he in charge of one?_ A pang of hunger ended that train of thought before it even truly began.

Kame decided to swing by the market on the way home and buy some ingredients for dinner. Due to his parents being almost perpetually away from home, he'd actually amassed a reasonable level of skill as a chef. _Tonight I feel like… teriyaki beef_. That meant he'd have to go by the butcher's, so he turned in that direction, taking him through the restaurant district.

Somehow, he knew something was wrong from almost a block away. The feeling grew stronger with each step he took in that direction, and then he started to hear the whispers, coming from all directions. People weren't gathered or anything dramatic like that, but they all seemed to shy away from something, talking in hushed tones, all radiating from a central point maybe 20 meters away and to the right. Kame, almost afraid to look, pushed aside the curtain of Sunagakure's only ramen shop and saw Haku sitting alone at the bar.

Suddenly, the whispering grew all too clear to him. _Traitor. Spy. Murderer._ Even though the restaurant should have been full on a Friday night like tonight, it wasn't- quite a few tables were left empty, and the bar was barren of any customers whatsoever. _The hit-list wasn't supposed to be public; did someone release Haku's name?_ Kame walked towards his teammate, not sure what he intended to do but unable to stop himself from putting one foot ahead of the other.

He froze, though, when Tetsute emerged from the kitchen and stood across the bar from Haku, leering at her. _Crap, that's right, his parents run this place,_ Kame remembered. "Hey, Haku. Could you maybe… find somewhere else to eat?" She said nothing and didn't move, but he didn't let up. "Haku." When she still didn't move, he tapped her on the forehead, pushing her head back until she was looking at him. "You're scaring off all of the customers, _Kodoku_." The name seemed to finally draw something from her, as she stood up and turned towards the door.

Her eyes met Kame's, and he saw the level of pain that was there, as she walked towards him. He thought about his home, and his dinner plans, and about inviting her to eat at with him… But in the eyes of Tetsute staring at him, he simply froze like a deer in the headlights and let Haku go right around him and out of sight, with townspeople parting to keep a visible bubble around her until she was out of sight.

Tetsute grabbed him by the arm. "Hey, dude, what's up! It's been a few days, how the new squad? Can't imagine it's much fun with Miriki and Kodok- I mean, Haku, on it…" His grin weakened a little when Kame didn't respond. "Let's catch up over some ramen, eh? Gotta grab seats quick, though, with her gone the bar's gonna fill up in minutes." Kame still remained silent and still. "Kame? Earth to Kame, what-"

Kame turned to look his friend in the eye, hoping the accusation in his heart made it to his face and voice. "How long have you been picking on Haku like this!?"

Tetsute narrowed his eyes. "I'm not… Are you defending her?" He seemed genuinely amazed by this reaction. "You, Kame Hakiara, _you're_ gonna lecture me!? I'm pushing her out of my family's shop because as long as she's in here, we're not making any money. You know how she is; people already avoid her like the plague. Not to mention how Genji overheard some some Interior Defense chunin talking about how she was the one who killed Genku, and now everyone knows that she did it. She's a traitor and a loser, she's costing us money, and so I told her to leave the restaurant! You have no right to-"

This time, Kame grabbed the other boy's shirt to shut him up. "And you had no right to try to push her out of our team!"

"What? How did you- You know what, it doesn't even matter. You have no moral high ground to stand on, Kame." Tetsute swung an arm up to dislodge Kame's hand from his shirtfront. "You sat there with me and Rakuyo at the academy talking down about all of the other students. You called everyone below us weaklings and treated them as badly as Rakuyo and I did. What was that nickname you came up for for Miriki? Loverboy?"

Kame was too lost in his thoughts to make any retort. Was he really like them, a bully? He considered all the times he'd brushed off students asking him for tips on ninjutsu, ignored their attempts at friendship, and dismissed them mentally simply because he was stronger than them. For some reason, Deihaka's parting words from a few days ago came into his mind: 'Do you really want to be that kind of person?' But faced with Tetsute and with all of the ugliness of neglect sitting in his mind, there was only one answer. "No." Kame steeled himself. "I never hated any of them. And I definitely never tried to hurt any of them. That's what makes me and you different."

Tetsute snorted, but turned back towards the kitchen of the restaurant. "Sure, sure, whatever lets you sleep peacefully. I guess spending too much time with the cripples made you start loving them, eh?" Kame didn't even merit that statement with a response, simply turning towards the butcher's shop and trying to make peace with himself mentally.

However, even after buying, preparing, and eating dinner, he still wasn't able to calm his troubled mind. The more he thought about it, the more he realized that Tetsute had always been this way- but not only that, he also realized that he himself had been that way. On the day of the academy graduation exam, he'd dismissed the weaker participants just because his scores had been higher. Did skill at shuriken throwing really give his life any more meaning than theirs?

Even recently he'd been selfish. All week long, he'd been so relieved to be off the hook for treason that he'd ignored Haku's suffering, which had probably been infinitely worse than his as someone who'd already been an outcast. _Kodoku_. Tetsute's nickname for her literally meant 'loner', and tonight had been Kame's first real taste of what that meant. The image of her sitting alone at the bar stuck in his mind, and even when he escaped to sleep his dreams were of running to sit next to Haku but never reaching her.


	8. Arc 1 Vol 8: New Objectives

**Ninja Profile: Rakuyo Kunayari**

Ninjutsu: B  
Genjutsu: C  
Taijutsu: B

Description: Rakuyo stands at a normal height, usually found with confident posture and an easygoing smirk. She wears the shirt and skirt typical for kunoichi, tying her black hair back in a ponytail. Her eyes are hazel-green, as is her clothing.

Origin: Rakuyo hails from the Kunayari family within the Hidden Sand. The Kunayari have been producing Sand shinobi since the village was founded and Rakuyo is not one to break from their tradition. She became a ninja to honor the legacy of her ancestors, but (along with Tetsute and Kame) upon entering the academy she found that most of the students were more untalented than she'd imagined. Rather than accept that her own ancestors had been this way, Rakuyo chose to believe that the 'weaklings' she found simply didn't deserve to be ninja and treated them as such.

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Mere minutes after getting up, Kame heard a knock on the door and was met with the sight of an middle-aged male Interior Defense ninja standing just outside. When the man saw him, he sighed and delivered a message in a monotone that indicated his complete lack of interest in the task at hand: "You have been summoned to the Kazekage's office. Our lord Gaara wishes to apologize for your treatment during the recently concluded investigation. You also have the deepest apologies of the Interior Defense Corps for our misconviction of you."

Before Kame could ask for any more details, the man had already walked away, leaving the him in a confused state of suspension- _So they found the real traitor, and now the Kazekage himself wants to apologize to me? Can I eat breakfast first? Is this thing right now, or…?_ Kame decided that perhaps it would be better to be safe than sorry, and left straight for the Kazekage's office. A long walk later and he was standing before the literal center of the Village Hidden in the Sand, preparing himself to go inside.

Even as he stepped into the building, a nagging suspicion in his head grew louder and louder. _Why would the Kazekage apologize to me? This doesn't seem like a normal occurrence, and besides, it's Naziru who should be apologizing._ He briefly shuddered at the absurdity of the image of that evil-looking woman apologizing to him. There was definitely something off, but Kame had little choice other than to walk forward until a shinobi stepped over and looked him in the eye. "Kame Hakiara?"

Kame could only nod, which seemed to satisfy the older ninja. The man began walking towards a door off to the left, tossing, "follow me," over his shoulder. They walked along a winding circular path, past door after door and up a good five or six floors, all in complete silence. Finally they reached a larger set of double door and his guide stopped, gesturing towards the entrance. "The Kazekage's expecting you."

 _Could he have phrased that any more ominously?_ Kame hoped that his nervous swallow wasn't noticeable as he stepped into the office of the Kazekage for the first time in his life. Upon entering, the first thing he thought was, _This is actually… not that intimidating_. The office was sparsely decorated with a bare minimum of a few portraits hung on the walls, a large window at the back, and a desk and two chair, upon one of which sat… _I take it back, this is very intimidating._ The Kazekage was staring at him with sullen blue eyes ringed in black.

Kame stood, locked in place, until Gaara gestured towards the chair and raised an eyebrow. The genin coughed a little and nodded, shuffling forwards to sit down in the seat and bowing his head in deferrence. _Why isn't he talking? Am I supposed to greet him?_ "Um… hello… I mean, greetings, lord Kazekage!" _Damn, I sounded so awkward._

Gaara sighed. "Lift up your head and look at me, Kame." Kame raised his eyes to meet the Kazekage's. "I've called you here to apologize for you being taken in during the recent investigation, which was uncalled for given what little evidence we had at the time."

Kame failed to suppress the confusion in his mind from making it to his face, and desperately tried to cover it up with a rushed statement. "B-but you're the Kazekage, why… why would you have to apologize to me, and… I mean, it… it was Naziru who pulled me in, and I don't think…"

Gaara nodded, cutting his stuttering off before it could go any further. "You're right. I wouldn't call you all the way out here to deliver a formal apology; we have mail for that purpose. But now that I've gotten that pretense out of the way, I have another subject to discuss with you, something that I need you to do."

Kame swallowed. _I should feel honored that the Kazekage would give me a task, but why do I feel like this is going to be…_ "What is it?" He asked.

"I need you to be a better teammate to Haku Yorutsume." Lord Gaara's face had turned almost a little bit… sad? Regretful?

However, Kame was already hung up on the issue of Kame, and when someone else pushed him on it he instinctively snapped. "I have! I haven't done anything to her, it was the other kids who picked on her! I've included… I've…" He trailed off. _Last night I left her alone, didn't I? I have no ground to stand on here._

The Kazekage was unimpressed. "Whatever it is that you're doing, you're failing."

"Why don't _you_ do something, then?" Kame was reckless in his defensiveness, forgetting momentarily that he was speaking the the Kazekage.

"Because… Deihaka explained her situation to you, yes? As much as Naruto has helped to make the ninja world a more peaceful place, there remains a power balance between the village. For the Hidden Sand to have not only the onetails jinchuriki, but also a fragment of the Tentails, would upset that balance. I can't afford to pay her any undue attention or other villages would take notice. A few years ago, they _did_ , and-" he clammed up, but looked at Kame expectantly.

 _I guess it doesn't even matter if she's not a strong ninja_ , thought Kame. _As long as she holds the tentails, she's a target._ "You still put her alone, far from everyone. What did you think would happen if you separated her from everyone else and left them with only one memory of her, a terrible one?"

The Kazekage was acting strangely. He leaned forward, putting his head in his hands, and sighed in defeat rather than exasperation. "I… I didn't have any choice. She attacked the other children. Every parent who had a child there was begging me to move her to another village. I can't just… wave my hands and make her accepted and loved, don't you understand?" He sounded like he was arguing to himself more than anyone else.

"I'm doing as much as I can, but neither can I." Kame shook his head.

Lord Gaara didn't even register his words, continuing to mumble. "I thought… I thought that the Kage of the past were wrong. I was so sure that I wouldn't repeat their mistakes, but… I'm no different, am I? I'm even worse."

 _Well, this is the most awkward I've ever felt,_ thought Kame. _What am I supposed to do here…? Do I comfort the Kazekage? Maybe I should just leave._ Suddenly Gaara seemed to snap out of whatever mental state he'd been and looked up at him. "Kame, I can't do any more for her. You have to help her, whatever it takes."

Kame was annoyed at this point. "Lord Kazekage, with all due respect, I've already told you that I'm doing everything I can!"

"Well it's not enough!" The Kazekage's eyes blazed, but Kame wouldn't back down either.

"Who are you to tell me what's enough!? You don't even know her, and you're preaching at me about what she needs! I'm trying to-"

The Kazekage cut him off with a voice devoid of passion. "Last night, Haku tried to kill herself."

 _What?_

The news went off like a bomb in Kame's mind, and he shut up instantly. _She… she tried…_ the simple facts refused to register. In shock, his mind drifted to the scene at the restaurant, people keeping away from her and speaking about her behind her back. He remembered Tetsute publicly forcing her to leave the restaurant, calling her _Kodoku_ and telling her that everyone hated her. And then, he remembered himself, standing there and just watching her like every other person in the restaurant- no, like every other person in her life.

 _What the hell is wrong with me?_ Kame collapsed forward, head in his hands, just as the Kazekage had done minutes before. He imagined what Haku had felt, coming back from a mission that must have been one of the first times she'd felt accepted in her life, maybe even hoping that things had changed… Only to return to a village hating her even more than they already had. To be bullied by the same guy, silently hated by the same townspeople, pushed out of the training she'd started to enjoy, and even ignored by one of the people she'd believed in. _I'm pathetic._

Lord Gaara gathered himself, facing Kame again. "Late last night, we found and dealt with the man who'd killed Genku, and I decided to go to Haku's house and apologize to her. By sheer chance I found her mid-fall off of the cliff after jumping off. If she'd died there's a good chance that the tentails would have emerged and destroyed the Hidden Sand. I caught her, did my best to calm her, and stayed with her until she eventually fell asleep and I was confident that she wouldn't try it again. However, this is unsustainable- if she was depressed enough to end her own life, then she's in pain and has been for a long time."

Kame raised himself slowly until he was sitting straight up and looking Gaara in the eye. "I… I'm going to help… I promise on my life as a Shinobi of the Village Hidden in the Sand that I will help her, however I can. I'll protect her from ever going to that place again."

The Kazekage let out a long breath. "I truly hope that you can succeed where I failed, Kame. Haku… She reminds me so much of myself, and of Naruto, but instead of blaming the people around her like I did or the flawed shinobi world like Naruto did, she blames herself. It's a heavy burden that you're trying to lift from her shoulders."

Kame nodded, now set in his course. "I'll do it. I swear to save Haku."

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When the squad next gathered, later that day, Kame had done some research and had something to suggest. This time, Miriki's tardiness didn't annoy him (much) because there was an idea he wanted to share with Deihaka and Haku. "Deihaka-sensei, Haku," he said, getting their attention, "I have a suggestion."

Deihaka looked at him curiously. "Let's hear it."

"I think that, if you're going to continue teaching us jutsu, Haku is just wasting her time." Kame felt a little bit of regret for putting it that way when he saw Haku flinch and turn away. "I think that we need a trainer who can instruct her in high-level taijutsu. No offense, sensei, but I don't think you're the right person to do that."

Deihaka shrugged but didn't object to the statement. Kame decided to keep going, seeing Haku start to look a little more happy. "I spoke to the Kazekage and he told me about someone similar to you, Haku- someone who couldn't use ninjutsu or genjutsu at all but ended up as a successful ninja anyway. His name is Shira and he's currently living far to the north, on the outskirts of the Land of Wind."

Haku glanced up at him and her eyes betrayed a glimmer of hope. "I… if he really can teach me, then…"

Deihaka was more skeptical. "Okay, that sounds great, except for the fact that this man lives at the northern border, and Haku is on our team. How is that going to work?"

"Well, that's the thing… Lord Kazekage told me that he's likely to respond a lot more favorably if Haku is actually in front of him, so… can we go to him?" Deihaka started to say something, his face twisting in frustration, but Kame quickly continued. "We aren't up for any missions, but since Haku's been cleared the squad should be okay to leave the village, right? We could make it there in only a day or two and then try to convince him to come back with us."

Deihaka shook his head. "I'm not taking the whole squad two days north to go harass an old retired ninja at his own home." Haku's shoulders sagged a little bit, but then- "However, we technically _aren't_ up for any missions, so I could… hold off on resuming them for a few days. I would remain and teach Miriki, of course, but you two could go."

Kame cheered a little bit internally before turning to Haku. "Sounds great. Haku, can you pack up? We can leave this afternoon, if you want." She nodded. "Okay, let's meet up at the village gate at… two?" Another nod, then Haku darted off towards her house, leaving Kame to head towards his, stopping by Kankuro's workshop to let him know the situation.

"You're neglecting your training!? We're two lessons in, you ingrateful-"

"Master, I'm truly sorry, but… it's Haku. She needs a teacher, so I'm heading off to find one with her."

"Haku, isn't she the..." Kankuro's eyes widened in realization, but then he shook his head and resumed a frustrated expression. "What about _your_ teacher, you disobedient, undutiful, lazy... argh. This is what I get for choosing you as the inheritor of my art?"

Kame winced. "I'm sorry, Master. But the Kazekage- I mean, Gaara, told me to help her find a better mental state, and I think this is the only way I can do that. She's in a lot of pain, and..." he trailed off, but it was enough to make Kankuro's resistance melt away.

"Go, then. I… I wish I'd been there for Gaara the way you're here for the Yorutsume girl." Kankuro's voice was no longer angry, but forlorn. Kame remembered the stories he'd heard of the Kazekage's childhood, and of the neglect and hatred he'd suffered so much like Haku had.

Kame then went straight for his house, picking up enough food for six nights (three if he shared with Haku) as well as a generous supply of ninja tools and paperbombs. Packing everything into his satchel, he then went straight for the gate. Haku arrived about the same time as he did, and wordlessly they left for their destination.

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They finally arrived in the late afternoon the next day, a bit over 24 hours after they had left the Village Hidden in the Sand. Their destination was somewhat unimpressive; a small gathering of houses with a few small farms surrounding it. They'd long since left the massive desert that the Land of Wind was famous for, the country now looking more like savannah.

Kame had spoken with Haku during the trip there, more than he ever had before- although that wasn't saying much. She was extremely reluctant to share her opinions or beliefs with him, although she _was_ quick to comment on other things. Funnily enough, she was actually almost as much of a geek about historical ninja as he was. They'd spent a good hour arguing over the relative strengths of the members of the Akatsuki (she _still_ maintained that Kisame would have won against Konan, despite his taijutsu being most likely worthless against her Dance of the Shikigami).

The books he'd found at her home made a little more sense now; they were histories of the Shinobi World Wars. Haku was strangely obsessed with finding more information about strong ninja, especially strong users of the various kekkegenkai scattered about the villages. However, when Kame had asked her about her own clan, she'd had very little to say. When he asked about its collapse, she'd closed up to him completely again, so he'd quickly abandoned the project.

When they found their way into the village center, a sand chunin approached them carefully. "What is your business here?" _Ah, yes, this village is close to the border, so they're more likely to be suspicious of newcomers' intentions,_ Kame thought, remembering his parents' stories about enemy spies attempting to cross in from other lands.

He decided to take the initiative in their conversation. "I'm here to find a retired shinobi who goes by the name 'Shira'. Do you know anything about where I could locate him?"

The chunin still didn't back down. "And why are you hunting Shira?"

Kame was confused- his Sand headband was clearly visible on his forehead, as was Haku's around her neck. "We're Sand shinobi looking for another sand shinobi, I don't see what the problem is here…?"

The chunin loosened up only a little bit. "Shira is… he's not in a great state to accept visitors. His wife died a few weeks ago, and he's in mourning. Nobody's seen him since then, he's just holed himself up in that house." _Crap,_ Kame thought, _he'll never accept- wait, what am I thinking!? A woman died and all I can think about is her husband being less likely to help me!?_

While he was stuck mentally reprimanding himself, Haku stepped forward. "I… I'm very sorry about his loss. However, should he really be left by himself?"

"Huh?" The chunin narrowed his eyes.

"Well, someone close to him died, and you're leaving him to deal with it alone? Does he have any friends in this village?"

"Of course!" The man seemed to take her criticism as a personal attack. "He's lived and worked here for decades, almost everyone here would count themselves among his friends!"

Haku looked at him with confusion. "But when he most needs friendship, you're leaving him to deal with the pain alone? Besides, the question isn't whether you count yourself among his friends, the question is are you being a friend to him?" Kame didn't know what to think. For someone who'd been so alone, Haku certainly had a lot to preach about friendship- although, she wasn't wrong. Maybe her loss and loneliness had helped her to understand Shira's situation better than anyone else.

The chunin's eyes widened in slight realization, but he still blocked their path. "I'm afraid that unless you tell me specifically what you're doing in this village, I need to ask you to leave."

Kame butted back in. "We're looking for taijutsu training. Haku," he gestured towards her, "needs a high-level instructor in hand-to-hand taijutsu and we weren't able to find any in the Hidden Sand. The Kazekage told us of Shira, and so we came here."

At the mention of the Kazekage's name, the chunin finally broke. "Fine, go on ahead, he lives in the house over on that hill" he said, pointing towards the house in question and stepping out of their way. As they walked by him, though, Kame heard him mutter, "If you're trying anything sneaky, I guess it's your funeral." _Was he talking about Shira?_ Kame wondered. _If he's a taijutsu specialist around Lord Gaara's age, then how dangerous could he be? Taijutsu users rely heavily on their body, and time wreaks havoc on their abilities._

Nevertheless, he pushed forward with Haku along the main street of the town, dodging a pair of giggling children. One of them tagged the other and then they ran back the way they'd come, with a reversal of who was chasing who. They were so caught up in it that the lead girl ran straight into Haku, bouncing off and falling backwards. Haku flinched, far more than she should have, and looked strangely _afraid_ of the child, but stopped a little bit when she saw the girl get up and smile at her.

"I don' think I've seen you 'fore!" The little girl had to be five or six.

Haku smiled hesitantly. "That's because I'm just here visiting. What's your name?"

The girl pointed at her friend. "I'm Yuki, an' this is Kina!" She tilted her head, looking at Haku curiously. "What's your name? An' who are you visiting?"

Haku smiled. "My name's Haku. I'm here to see Shira, do you know him?"

The girl's smile somehow widened even further. "Shira's the best! He's always nice an' smart an' cool an' gives us candy!" She lowered her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "Mom says I'm not allowed to eat too much candy, but Shira still gives it to me… 'least, he used to, 'fore auntie Yome died…" The girl bowed her head a little bit, her brilliant smile disappearing.

Haku slung her pack around, digging around inside it for a few seconds before finally pulling out a closed hand. She reached forward and opened it in front of the little girl, whose eyes widened at the sight of a few wrapped candies sitting on her open palm. After a few seconds of awe, the girl looked up at Haku. "Can I have 'em? Really?"

"Yeah, go ahead." The moment Haku's words left her mouth, the girl had snatched the candies and unwrapped one in milliseconds. "Thanks, new lady! Tell uncle Shira I said hi!" The girl darted off, offering another of the candies to her friend as they disappeared behind another building.

When they continued on their way, Kame couldn't help but glance over at Haku. _Why is she so different now?_ He wondered what she would have been like if the Sand hadn't neglected her. _Is this the real Haku? Smiling, great with kids, always wanting to lend a hand to people who are sad?_

They finally reached their destination, a small cottage up on a hill near the center of the tiny town. There was no fence or gate, so Kame just shrugged and walked straight up to the door, knocking a few times. The door was opened almost the second his knuckles left the wood, and he found himself staring at an old man with hair completely white, although his weirdly youthful skin wasn't wrinkled at all.

The man spoke in a voice that was also deceptively young-sounding, more like a middle-aged man than an elder. "Hello, visitors, my name is Shira."

Kame started to reply. "Greetings. My name is Kame, and this is Ha-"

He was cut off almost immediately. "Come in, come in. Why don't you tell me your names?"

 _What is wrong with this guy?_ Kame tried again. "My name is Kame, and my friend's name is Ha-"

"Speak up! I don't hear very well anymore, you'll have to be louder than that."

Kame looked around, wondering if this was some sort of elaborate prank, before starting again, enunciating and raising his voice a bit. "Hello. My name is Kame and-"

"Come on, kid, I said I don't hear so well." Shira was like a blank slate, staring at him.

 _Crap, if I make him any more self-conscious about his hearing I might blow my chance at getting Haku a teacher!_ Kame steeled himself, before screaming (with a fair bit more voice cracking than he'd like to admit): "HELLO! MY NAME IS KAME HAKIARA AND THIS IS… Is… is…" He trailed off at the sight of Shira laughing hysterically, almost falling out of his seat. Haku was laughing right along with the older man- Haku was laughing! Kame had never heard her laugh before, and she was surprisingly loud and energetic about it, in sharp contrast to her normally shy and calm demeanor.

Shira calmed down enough to get out a few words in between chuckles. "You… you should have seen the…" he put on a squeaky fake voice: "My nAmE Is kAMe hAkiARa!" Both he and Haku dissolved into laughter again, and this time Kame couldn't help but join in. As their laughter died down, finally Shira turned to Kame and spoke. "I can hear you fine, that was just a little bit of humor- you younger generation are so gullible around people you respect."

Kame nodded. "I… Anyway, as I was saying, my name is Kame Hakiara and this is my teammate, Haku Yorutsume. Before I get to why we've come, I'd like to offer my condolences for your wife."

Shira nodded, the mirth evaporating from his face. "I appreciate your sentiment. She was…" He trailed off. _How do I talk to him now?_ Kame was unsure how to proceed. _Asking him for something now is probably a bad idea, but I can't just leave… What do I do?_

Kame tested the waters a little bit. "Are you going to leave this village? Now that…"

Shira shook his head sadly. "No, I have to stay with Yome." He nodded towards a window, outside of which there was a grave sitting next to the house.

 _He's still attached to her_ , Kame thought, but decided now was as good a time as any to make his request. "Shira-san, I have a request for you." When Shira looked up at him, he continued. "I want to ask you to come to the Village Hidden in the Sand, and help train Haku."

Shira frowned. "I'm honored that you came all this way to ask for my help in training her, but… I have to stay…" He glanced again at the grave.

Haku spoke up. "Shira-san, Yuki and Kina really miss you."

"I…" At the mention of the two little girls, Shira frowned.

Kame sensed his chance, and filled in where Shira had left off. "You are mourning your wife, and I understand that. But let me tell you something about Haku, before you make your decision." Gaara had told Kame the full story of Shira and his squad before they'd left. "When Yome first came to you, what was it that drew her to you?

"You were a ninja without genjutsu or ninjutsu, and somehow through force of will you forged a path for yourself. She admired you for that, and wanted to help you, didn't she?" Shira didn't deny it. "Haku is like you. She cannot use genjutsu or ninjutsu, so taijutsu is her only way forward. I want to help her, but I'm not skilled enough at taijutsu to help her move any further forward- and neither is anyone else in the Hidden Sand. You're the only one our Lord Kazekage could think of who would be up to the challenge of this task."

Shira opened his mouth to reply, but closed it again, indecision written plain all over his face. Kame seized his chance to make a final point: "What do you think Yome would want you to do? Watch the potential of a shinobi much like you go unrealized because of her, or help the next generation like she helped you?" When Kame finished, he noticed Haku staring at him with something unreadable in her eyes. Instead of meeting her gaze, he felt himself blush a little bit and turned to hide his face.

The elder ninja at the table sighed and looked once more out the window, before turning back to the two of them. "I accept my Kazekage's wishes, then. Haku, I'll teach you everything I know before I pass from this world. Yome helped me achieve my dream, and I'll be damned if I don't help you achieve yours." Then he stood suddenly, making his way over to the refrigerator. "You two must be hungry from traveling here. We can leave for the Hidden Sand tomorrow, but for tonight you two should stay here. I'll fix us some dinner."

Kame grinned. "What are you making? I can help." He walked over to stand beside Shira in the kitchen, but stopped and rolled his eyes at the sight of a water boiler and a few packets of instant noodles. _I can't really help with that, now can I?_ He turned around to sit back down at the table with Haku, remaining silent for the couple of minutes until Shira brought over three bowls of packaged noodles.

They were mostly done when Shira finally broke the quiet with a question. "How is Gaara these days, eh? I haven't seen him in a long time!"

Haku shifted a little in her seat. "He's… he seems to be all right. I saw him the other…" She trailed off and blushed furiously, looking away from Shira. _That's right, the last time she saw Gaara was when she-_

Shira started to press the topic, but Kame cut him off, coming to Haku's rescue. "Lord Gaara is quite well. Things have been mostly quiet in the Hidden Sand recently, but the times I've seen him he's been as wise and kind as ever."

The chunin nodded. "That's good to hear. I always knew he'd be a good Kazekage… I don't suppose you all know anything about Rock Lee, do you? This village is pretty isolated, so I rely on travelers to get the news. Did he end up as a splendid ninja as he'd hoped?" Kame remembered the Kazekage telling him that the two taijutsu-only users of that generation had formed a bond with each other at their chunin exams.

"Yes, he-" Haku and Kame both answered at the same time, and then Haku receded and let Kame continue. "He was fairly well known, less so now. Towards the end of the Fourth Shinobi War, he- well, his master, Might Guy, fought Madara Uchiha in single combat with only taijutsu and nearly beat him."

Apparently news of the Shinobi War at least _had_ reached this village, or at least stories of Madara Uchiha's strength, because Shira leaned back, satisfied. "He must have… wait, did he open the eighth gate?" The satisfaction was gone, replaced with concern.

Kame nodded. "Yeah, but he was able to live somehow… I don't know, there are conflicting reports on what happened." _The Eight Inner Gates: the strongest taijutsu technique there is, but with a brutal cost,_ he recalled. "As far as I know, after that Rock Lee has operated as a successful Leaf Ninja for a long time."

Shira smiled. "Good, good." He must have been good friends with the leaf shinobi. A few moments of silence passed, and then he abruptly stood up and pointed towards a doorway beside the kitchen. "You two take the stairs up to the bedroom. I'll sleep down here."

Kame wanted to argue that they could sleep on the floor; he didn't want to impose, but Haku was already opening the door and climbing the steps. Shrugging, he followed her and made his way up the short flight of stairs up to the bedroom. Inside he saw a single large bed and two cabinets were the only furnishings. _Okay,_ he thought, _there's only one bed, so how are we-_

Haku was already lying in it, her pack, coat, and boots in a pile on the floor. _Nevermind, then._ Kame spread out his bedroll on the floor and laid down, quickly disappearing into sleep devoid of the nightmare that had shaken him so much the day before.


	9. Arc 1 Vol 9: Old Friends

**(A/N) I'd love to hear advice on my writing, no matter how negative it may be. I'm always looking to improve, so if you feel like it a review would be much appreciated!**

 **Ninja Profile: Shira**

Ninjutsu: F  
Genjutsu: F  
Taijutsu: S

Description: Shira is a tall, solidly-built man whose vigor and strength haven't faded despite his old age. His once-grey hair is now white, and as a retired ninja he now wears casual shirts and pants instead of shinobi garb. His normal expression and stance radiate unconcern, even boredom.

Origin: Shira had aspired from a young age to become a ninja, but due to an inability to use Ninjutsu or Genjutsu he was bullied by his peers. However, he still gave it his all and eventually, the Fifth Kazekage noticed his struggle and paid special attention to him. After meeting with success in the chunin exams, Shira left for the northern border of the Land of Wind, seeking out a job in a special squad up there along with his squadmate Yome.

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Kame blinked his way back into the world of the waking, eyes drifting around but finally settling on the clock, which read: 10:13. He jolted awake, sitting up too fast and tripping over his bedroll. _10:13!? I haven't slept in that late… well, since I can remember._ In the Hidden Sand, morning was heralded by noises from all directions, and since he usually had lessons scheduled an alarm would wake him if the ambient noise didn't. However, in this small border village, the morning was eerily quiet and peaceful.

When he sat up, he noticed that Haku wasn't in the bed, and her belongings were also gone. He quickly grabbed all of his own possessions and stumbled down the stairs, still blinking the grogginess away. When he entered the main room, though, it was also empty of people. Hesitantly, Kame called out as loudly as he dared, "Hey! Haku? Shira? Where are you two?"

No response. Just before he tried it again, his eyes flickered down towards the table, on top of which rested a note. Kame stepped over to it and scanned it briefly, his brow furrowing at first in confusion and then in horror at the contents: _Kame,_ it read, _Haku and I have decided to go on ahead since you slept in so late. You can come along whenever you wake up, catch up if you really want to go with us. -Shira._

Kame looked around him and saw that, while the house's furniture remained untouched, little details revealed that Shira had in fact moved out; a few pictures had been removed, and all of the food was gone. _Did those… Did they seriously leave without me!?_ Now a strange combination of rage and panic set in and he rushed out the door, entering a full sprint within seconds towards the Hidden Sand. _When I catch up to them, I'm going to let them have it._

He was so frustrated that he almost missed Haku and Shira on his right- luckily, he did notice them in time. Unluckily, his response to noticing them was to faceplant into the dirt road at full sprinting speed. Kame clawed his way back onto his feet and whipped around to see the two of them sparring in a small clearing besides the road. If they had noticed him coming, neither of them registered it.

Before he let them have it, he took a brief moment to appreciate the martial skill displayed before him. The two of them moved so quickly they were like blurs, and yet every strike was clearly targeted and executed to perfection. Back and forth the fight went, both participants getting momentary advantages, but after only a short time Kame could clearly see that Haku had the disadvantage. Her attacks were more defensive than anything, while Shira's movements were similar to how a cat acted when it was playing with its food.

Suddenly, Shira ended it with an intense flurry of blows that Haku was barely able to deflect, each one forcing her more and more out of her defensive position, and then he unleashed a final strike that stopped just short of her face. His fist, frozen an inch before its target, still carried enough wind just from its force to stagger Haku a little bit and blow her hair backwards. Kame remembered himself from just a day ago doubting Shira and laughed a little bit internally.

Haku was still dazed from the exchange, but Shira seemed to finally notice him. "Hey, Kame," he called out, waving a hand. "Glad to see you…" He snickered, "finally caught up with us!" Another barely suppressed chuckle. Kame was confused about what was so funny, until he realized that it was him. Completely out of breath from the sprint there, covered with dirt from his ungraceful nosedive, and so annoyed he was probably steaming from the ears… _I must make a pretty ridiculous sight._

Haku recovered enough to smile and wave at him. "Kame! You were sleeping so peacefully; I didn't want to wake you." Kame may have been angry, but the rage burned out inside him at the sight of her so happy. He didn't have the heart to yell at her for accidentally helping Shira to prank him, especially not when she seemed to get along with the taijutsu master so well.

"Yeah… Well, I'm here now." Kame jerked his head towards the road. "What do you say? Deihaka-sensei's waiting for us, you know."

Haku nodded, although Kame could tell she wanted to keep sparring. "You're right, we should probably get going home now, huh?" She grabbed her pack and slung it over her shoulder, falling into step beside Kame.

Shira stepped over next to her and spoke. "Haku, I can tell that you have a lot of talent- more than Rock Lee or I had, to be completely honest. You can probably go further than either of us." Haku was clearly trying (and failing) to conceal her pride at the high praise. "However, when it comes to the basics, you clearly had a teacher who was a weapon-taijutsu specialist. My best guess is that he uses a short sword?" Kame nodded. Saitama, the taijutsu instructor at the academy, _was_ best known for his short sword technique- although, how Shira had figured that out just from sparring against Haku, he didn't know.

Shira continued. "The problem with using weapon-type tactics as a martial fighter is that you end up wasting a lot of your mobility. When he gets knocked out of guard stance, he has to move his sword back into the correct position, which is how he taught you to use your hands. However, you're a lot more flexible than a sword- if you get knocked out of guard stance, you can come back in an instant, or better yet turn it into a counterattack." He kept going, explaining to an extreme level of detail all of the ways Haku had to improve as their little group followed the road back towards the Hidden Sand.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

When they made it back to the village at noon the next day, Shira peeled off to go greet the Kazekage in person and find lodgings, leaving Kame and Haku alone at the gate. Kame remembered that he had a puppetry lesson scheduled- Kankuro would probably expect him to be back by now. He turned to go to the Hidden Sand Armory, but a hand on his shoulder stopped him.

Kame spun around to see Haku looking flusteredly down at his feet, moving an arm up behind her head in a strangely familiar display of awkwardness. She finally spoke up, looking at him despite rapidly blushing cheeks. "Kame, I… thanks… I mean, I want to thank you for…"

He nodded. "I'm happy to do it for a friend." When he called her a friend, she seemed to briefly lose her nerve and look away like she had before.

She gathered herself again and looked back into his eyes. "No, I want to… I have to say this. Kame, I want to thank you for… for doing all of this, and for believing in me. Nobody but Gaara has ever really treated me like this, and I will make it up to you somehow, someday." Immediately after finishing, she tore her eyes away and darted off. Kame felt himself smile against his better judgement at the image- she looked so much like the girl from a few days ago in the border village who'd darted off in exactly the same way after receiving candy.

With more happiness in his stride, he took his own leave and started off towards Kankuro and his lessons. After the long journey through the Land of Wind and back, the quick trip through the Village Hidden in the Sand was easy; he found himself standing before the door to the armory in practically no time at all. The door guard glanced him over before opening it, allowing him in. A few short passageways later, and he found himself standing in the doorway to the puppet room at the exact time his lesson was slated to begin.

When he turned on the light, Kankuro was sitting in the chair, but at the sudden brightness flailed briefly before falling out of it. In milliseconds, the man was on his feet, glowering at him. "Where the hell did you come from? How about a little warning before you do that next time!?"

Kame looked down, hoping that Kankuro took it as a sign of apology rather than an attempt to hide his smile. "I'm sorry, master. I'll try to warn you before I turn on the lights in the future."

Kankuro, as if realizing the ridiculousness of his position, cleared his throat and sat back down. "Well then, Kame, let's get down to it. Were you able to find Shira?" _Gaara must have told him the specifics of the trip,_ Kame realized.

"Yes, and he agreed to help Haku in her training."

"Good." Kankuro nodded slowly. "Now, where did we last leave off? Oh yes, you exhausted all of your chakra and wasted both of our time." Kame coughed awkwardly and failed to meet his master's eyes. "Since we agreed you're not going to do that again, if you feel like you can't manage something I ask you to do, try it another way. When you were bringing out that spike yesterday, you weren't activating the mechanism, you were literally forcing it through the mechanism and the wood, completely breaking the whole thing.

 _That did seem way too hard…_ Kame nodded. _I guess that I need an understanding of the intricacies of the puppets as well, huh?_ He tentatively responded. "Could… could I see the plans or schematics for the puppets I'm to use? I want to know the mechanisms so that I can activate the right ones."

Kankuro shook his head. "Nah, It'll be better if I just show you. I know all of these puppets inside and out." He raised the same arm Kame had been focusing on during the last class. "Now, inside of this arm is a spring that sits behind the blade, right about here." He pointed at a point about a third of the way up ts forearm. "Then there's the blade itself, which has a notch near its base. Set into the notch is a little metal lever, preventing the blade from releasing." He tossed the arm up into the air and it hung there, about four feet off of the ground. "Now, if I push with my chakra on the little lever, rather than the blade…" The blade shot out from just above the arm's hand.

Kame nodded, although he couldn't help but feel that he'd been treated a little bit unfairly. "Master… Why didn't you tell me about this before?"

Kankuro shrugged. "I wanted to see if you could figure it out for yourself- which, evidently, you couldn't."

Kame's pride stung from that one. "But, there's no visible…"

"Ah, yes, the genius idea of making the delicate, secret mechanisms of the puppets open for everyone to see." Kankuro's raised eyebrow silenced his pupil. "The puppet style, more than any other method of battle, relies on the mechanics of the puppet itself. To succeed, you need great chakra control, great battlefield awareness, and great tactical intelligence. However, to _excel_ , you need not only to understand the puppet, but also to yourself create newer and better techniques." Kankuro reset the blade again and then set the weapon down onto the table, stepping back to allow him another try.

Kame nodded. Turning back to the puppet arm, he threw out the familiar thread of chakra to it, binding his chakra network to the receiving mark on the wood of the creation. Next, he focused himself completely on it, trying to feel the switch that he knew was there, sending little flutters of chakra like echolocation until he found what he was looking for. With a mental nudge, he pushed it back gently, and the blade sprang out! _Yes! I am the greatest puppet master of all time! I am a prodigy!_ Although the self-praise was a bit much, he was too proud of himself to stop it.

Kankuro raised an eyebrow as if he could tell what Kame was thinking. "Okay then, now that you've managed to catch up to what Sasori could do at age 7, let's move on." _Oh,_ Kame thought, deflating a bit. "Now listen up: Forget everything I said before, when it comes to _moving_ the puppet, you have to brute-force it."

Kame's eyes widened a bit as Kankuro continued. "There's no springs or mechanisms for this one, you're just going to have to move them with the threads. A word of warning, though, before you go and break anything else for me to repair- When you're moving puppets, there are a few basic rules. First, you can't move the threads through anything with its own chakra network, or the threads will break. Second, never move the puppets out of your own sight. Unless you've been hiding a sensory-type jutsu specialty from me, there's no way for you to know what's happening to the puppet when it's out of your line of sight. Third, if you have threads attached to multiple body parts, make sure that whatever movements you're trying to make it execute will work with each other. If you rotate an arm upwards while moving the body to the side, you have to take into account the total movement when attempting to move the arm and change your path accordingly."

Kame nodded. _I think I got all that,_ he thought, _three rules: don't go through chakra networks, don't go in blind, and think about the whole body when moving things._ He refocused himself, looking forwards, and saw Kankuro crossing his arms. "Let's see you try to move the arm, Kame." _The arm? But I could barely move the blade yesterday…_

Nevertheless, Kame gritted his teeth and signaled to the chakra thread. Remembering how much effort it had taken to move something using his willpower the day before, he gathered himself fully and _pushed_ as hard as he could. Surprisingly, instead of resisting him like he'd thought it would, the arm went flying off diagonally upwards inches from Kankuro's face and impaling itself in the ceiling with the blade he'd never retracted.

Sheepishly, he turned to see Kankuro glaring at him. "Master… I'm sorry…"

Kankuro narrowed his eyes. "When I said brute-force it, I didn't mean… that."

"It's just that last time I had to push the blade out, it took a lot of force, so…"

His master rolled his eyes. "Did it ever occur to you that when you did that, you were forcing the blade to carve through resistant metal and wood? And that maybe, when there was only air in the way, it might go a little easier? No, wait, who am I kidding, of course it didn't." Kame frowned, still staring at the floor, but looked up a little bit at Kankuro's next words. "But… good work. I didn't expect you to be able to move it so quickly and, apparently, easily. I can move up a little bit in your tranining to full puppet use."

Kame nodded, a smile creeping over his face, as Kankuro turned to unhook one of the mannequin-type puppets and bring it down for him to bind with.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

When Kame finished that day's lessons, he had already managed to move around the larger training puppet Kankuro had finished for him. _I still have some leftover food,_ he thought. _Maybe I could invite Haku over to eat it with me?_ He decided to head to her house to ask her in person.

The route he took to his destination led him back through the downtown district, and uncomfortably close to the Hasagi family ramen shop. He hurried by, hoping that Tetsute would be out on a mission or training, but his hopes were dashed by a loud shout from above: "Yo, Kame! Stop right there, I want to talk to you!"

Wincing, he turned around to see not only Tetsute, but also Rakuyo making their way down from the roof of the restaurant, landing in front of him. Tetsute was out front, hands on his hips, wearing a classic smirk that Kame knew all too well on his face. "Kame, Kame, Kame…" he said the words in a patronizing voice. "You left so suddenly the other night, I didn't even get a chance to say goodbye…"

Kame rolled his eyes. He'd seen this same song and dance a thousand times, the casual lead in with sarcastic double-edged praise that Tetsute would follow up on with actual insults. _Wait, I have seen this a thousand times…_ Kame got lost in his thoughts again. _He did this at the academy. I was with him when he did this to other students… I laughed with him when he did this to other students! I was wrong when-_

Tetsute poked his chest. "You there, Kame? When I'm talking to you, I expect a reponse!" The last word was spoken with a full shove that knocked Kame back a few steps. He finally returned full attention to the situation at hand, looking up to see Tetsute satisfiedly smirking at him. "There we go…" Tetsute had moved on to the casual drawl that he used when talking to people who were scared of him.

Kame swallowed, mouth feeling strangely dry all of a sudden. "What do you want, Tetsute?"

Tetsute shrugged, nonplussed expression. "Well, what I want…? What I want is for you to come back, man…" He put a hand on Kame's shoulder. "Ever since you got grouped up with those losers, you've been drifting away. Even worse, you actually defended Kodoku last night." Kame opened his mouth to fight back, but then at the use of the Kodoku name he remembered something terrible.

 _Kame was back at the academy, sitting with Tetsute and Rakuyo at lunch break. "This Kodoku girl, she's really something else," Tetsute drawled. "Honestly, I don't know why she hasn't quit yet. Ever since she came to the academy, she's flunked every single ninjutsu test."_

 _Kame and Rakuyo smirked a little, but Tetsute shook his head at them, grinning. "No no no, you think I'm exaggerating, playing up her bad scores… but I'm dead serious. She can't cast a single jutsu!" Kame let out a little laugh at that. Did she really think she'd be able to pass?_

 _Rakuyo rolled her eyes. "She's pretty good at taijutsu, though…"_

 _Tetsute wouldn't hear it. "Taijutsu. Tai. Ninjutsu. Nin. Which one of those two seems more like something a nin-ja would need? Any moron can get into a fistfight, but being a ninja takes skill and mastery of jutsu. What makes her different than a common bandit?"_

 _Rakuyo giggled. "The real question is, what makes her different than some drunk dude in a bar?"_

 _Kame chuckled at that. "No, no, the drunk guy could still probably use more ninjutsu than she could!"_

 _The three of them shared a final laugh at the expense of this girl, and then lunch break was over and the teacher was calling them back in._

Kame remembered it all now. Little mentions in passing, minor updates from Tetsute or Rakuyo about the 'Kodoku' girl's latest failure. The talks had been good for a quick laugh or to be briefly grateful that he wasn't like her, but nothing more. How could he have forgotten this?

 _Rakuyo grimaced as she sat down at their usual bench, which Kame immediately picked up on. "What happened?"_

 _"Oh, nothing, I just got set to spar with Kodoku today. She seriously has no self-control, huh? Just a friendly sparring match, but she went all-out on me like she had something to prove…" Rakuyo shrugged, and Kame wondered why that girl would attack her like that._

 _Tetsute spoke up from Kame's other side. "She's always been that way, though… Don't you remember when we were kids- wait, no, you probably don't, your parents are nut jobs and trained you for all that time. Anyway, when I first met Kodoku, she…" At the time, Kame had been too momentarily distracted by reminder of his own early years to let Tetsute's next words sink in, but now in hindsight he could hear them clearly. "She came over and tried to show off some jutsu that she knew._

 _"Thirty seconds later and she's still trying to cast it, but there's nothing happening, so I push her out of the way so I can show her how it's done. Instead of clearing out, though, she jumps on me like some kind of angry animal, and I have to defend myself and the other kids from her until my parents get there. After that, I assumed that she'd learned not to freak out on people, but if she just did it to you…"_

 _Kame watched Tetsute and Rakuyo share a loaded look, and then Tetsute turned to him. "I think we need to teach her again, eh? You gonna come along, Kame?"_

 _Kame shook his head. "No, I've got to get home. My parents are leaving for the border again tonight, so I want to spend some time with them. Plus," he said, smirking at them, "if you two need my help to deal with one girl who can't even use ninjutsu or genjutsu, then..."_

 _Another laugh went through the group at his well-delivered insult._

"Kame." _I did know her before! What is wrong with me!? Is there something going on with my memory!?_ "Kame." _Why did I even help her at the graduation exam!? Did I get amnesia? How did I go from laughing at her to seeing who she really was overnight?_ "Kame!" The third repetition of his name was accompanied by a shove that landed him painfully on his ass. Tetsute stood over him, glaring daggers as anger finally made it into his voice. "What the hell has been up with you lately, Kame? You've been ignoring me all the time, you keep staring off into space for no reason, and you actually started rolling around in the dirt with Kodoku and company!"

Kame tried to get it together, still reeling from his memories. "I… I don't really know… I forgot how much we used to…" _bully people_ , he wanted to say, but couldn't force the words out.

Tetsute took his stilted half-sentence the wrong way. "We used to be friends. We used to agree that people like Loverboy and Kodoku didn't belong at the academy and sure as hell didn't belong among the Sand Shinobi. I really think teaming up with those losers is having a terrible influence on you, man."

Rakuyo joined in. "Are you honestly going to say that she wouldn't be a liability? What happens when you're in a battle and she gets hit with a genjutsu? Now what? The enemy has a prisoner and you have to either let her die or compromise her mission. Her dropping out would probably be for the best not just for you, but for her as well."

Kame recovered enough to think fully, and as he considered the situation he realized what he had to do. _Tetsute and Rakuyo… they think that by trying to break up our team, they're saving me,_ he thought. _As long as they're sure in that purpose, nothing is going to stop them from keeping up with their constant attempts. Maybe if I just go along with it… maybe the real me is the one that they know…_

'I swear to save Haku.' His words from the Kazekage's office cleared his mind. _I can't abandon her now; I'll never forgive myself. If Tetsute and Rakuyo think they can save me, then I have to make them realize that I don't want to be saved._ Kame looked up into the waiting eyes of Tetsute and then chuckled a little bit. "Wow, look at you two, saving me, such cool heroes…"

Tetsute's eyes narrowed as Kame rose to his feet, dusting all of the dust and sand from his pants. "We're not…"

"Oh, get off of your high horse, Tetsute." Kame leaned back a little more casually, crossing his arms. "I don't need you to save me because I'm completely fine. Although, to be honest, now I'm a little worried about you if you get this upset when a friend stops hanging out with you." Tetsute started to say something back but Kame didn't stop. "I just got tired of dealing with you two whining constantly about your classmates. There's only so much insecurity I can take, and the endless complaining about how you two were 'big, strong ninja who couldn't stand to be around the lesser creatures' pushed me past my limit.

"Have you ever stopped to think about how pathetic it makes you seem to care that much about how you look? To actually attack other students because you don't want them to make you look bad?" Kame rolled his eyes, secretly hoping that this tirade would break whatever strange hold he had on them. "I don't want to be on a team with you two. I would rather be on a team with Kodoku than you two, because ironically, she's the one who is less self-conscious about her abilities." Not strictly true, but it should get Tetsute mad enough to…

Yep. Tetsute's face was flushed with rage and his hand twitched towards the kunai pouch on his waist. "Kame, you… what part of insecure… why…" For once, the ever-confident genin had no comeback. Kame worried for a moment that he may have overdone it when Tetsute grabbed a kunai and half-stepped forwards; I don't know if I can take on both of them at once… but the point was moot because the other boy simply snarled and turned around to walk away, wordlessly followed by Rakuyo.

 _I think that's the last I'm going to see of them,_ thought Kame with more remorse than he'd realized. _Huh. As much as their actions disgust me now, I guess they were still my friends for a very long time…_ He let himself be sad for a moment, but soon the part of him that mourned their friendship had drifted to the back of his mind. By the time he found himself standing before the steps leading up to Haku's home, all traces of Tetsute and Rakuyo were gone from his mind.

Midway up the steps, he started to hear the sounds of battle, small impacts and quick feet against the sandy ground. Hurrying up the rest of the steps, upon cresting the top of the hill he realized what it was- Shira and Haku were at it again, sparring at the same blinding speed they'd had yesterday. However, this time the fight was just a little bit more even. Haku was still at a deficit, but now she was managing actual offense. In fact, he could see her putting Shira's advice from yesterday into her techniques; instead of trying to return to defense every time he landed a blow she chained her movements together and flowed around him.

This time, their match ended when Haku noticed Kame and stopped, with Shira pausing briefly before dropping his stance as well. She waved at him as she jogged over, smiling and asking, "What brought you over here, Kame?"

"Uh… It was…" Wait, what was I over here for? I knew when I left Kankuro, but then… "Umm…" Kame furiously tried to remember. I was going to… oh, yeah! "I was going to ask if you wanted to come and eat at my place? I mean, do you have any dinner plans?"

Haku shook her head. "No, I was just going to eat some more… it doesn't matter. I'll totally eat with you."

Before Kame could finish the conversation, a new voice came from behind him. "Hey, guys, long time no see!" _Not long enough,_ Kame thought, as Miriki lifted himself up onto the plane, followed by Deihaka. Miriki continued in the same 'greeting a distant relative' tone: "Me and Deihaka-sensei have made some real progress!" He glanced at Shira briefly. "And I see that you guys found Haku her trainer, I'm glad I could help with that."

"What." Miriki had been late that day and hadn't seen them since.

"Well, if I hadn't had the good judgement to show up late, then you guys wouldn't have had all that time to decide on finding this Shira guy." Miriki was grinning from ear to ear despite the ridiculous things he was saying.

Deihaka must have noticed Kame readying a withering verbal assault, because he hurriedly stepped in between the two genin and changed the subject. "Anyway, we're here because I want to have a team dinner to catch up. I'm buying."

Haku immediately agreed. "That's cool, me and Kame were already gonna eat together so we might as well make it a Team Eight thing…"

Kame sighed. "Sure, why not."

The jonin smiled. "Excellent, then let's go. Does anyone have any problem with going to Fukagaki's?" The restaurant in question was middle-end, had decent food, was owned by a nice retired shinobi, and most importantly was very far away from the Hasagi ramen shop.

"That sounds great!" Kame said, along with Haku and Miriki voicing their own support. Deihaka started down the steps, followed by Kame's two teammates, but before he could go he heard Shira speak behind him.

"Kame, do you know why I came back to this village?"

 _Oh crap, I forgot about him…_ Kame was ashamed for not thinking about Haku's teacher's dinner plans, and forgot what the question was. "What?"

Shira sighed. "I came here because you reminded me of Yome."

 _Where is this coming from?_ So far, half of his interactions with Shira had consisted of the older ninja messing with him. "Thanks…?"

Shira could clearly tell how awkward Kame felt. "You don't have to thank me… And I didn't mean anything having to do with you as a person, your personality and hers couldn't be more different. But when I look at what you do, and how much you want to help Haku, I can see Yome's kindness in your heart. Don't let this shinobi world take that away from you." Shira let out a long sigh, and then rolled his eyes. "Wow, I really am getting old. That sounded like something my grandmother would say… You'd better go catch up to your team."

Kame glanced behind himself instinctively. When he turned back to say goodbye to Shira, the man was already gone, leaving Kame to run off. Even as Kame caught up to the others, though, his head was still spinning from Shira's words.


	10. Arc 1 Vol 10: Training

**(A/N) Why are all of the Fairy Tail theme songs so good. _Snow Fairy_ is the best song ever.**

 **Ninja Profile: Gunaji Kokuseki**

Ninjutsu: B  
Taijutsu: B  
Genjutsu: C  
Specialties: Stone Bond, Accuracy, Long Range

Description: Gunaji is a Valley genin of average height and build, who wears his sandy-brown hair cut short. His bright blue eyes are always scanning for things he can use to his advantage, and his posture is very rarely relaxed. He almost always wears the Valley Shinobi vest on his chest and headband around his forehead, but stands out from other ninja due to the large container he carries on his back, full of stone he's always looking to improve.

Origin: Gunaji is from the Kokuseki clan, a minor family within the Village Hidden in the Valleys (their status is comparable to the Nara clan in terms of notoriety and respect). From a young age, he was always looking to make his clan's modest Stone Bond Jutsu into something as formidable as the legendary Sharingan of the leaf or Kekkeitota of the Stone. He became a ninja in order to hone his mastery of it and improve upon it further and further, and hopes to make the Kokuseki clan's name into stuff of legend.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

"Here you go!" Fukagaki came over with a few platters of food, giving each member of team eight what they'd ordered. Kame and Deihaka had ordered sashimi, Haku had asked for ramen, and Miriki had gotten a salad. The gathered ninja all took a second to enjoy the sight and smell of their food before digging into it. Kame froze briefly when he saw Haku beside him devouring her ramen at lightning speed, which sent a pang of sadness through him. _She must be subconsciously afraid of getting kicked out…_

"Hey, Fukagaki-san! Can I get another one?" _Or maybe she's just hungry._ The old shopowner smiled craftily and Deihaka paled slightly. _But shouldn't he be able to afford- wait, are jonin paid more than lower-ranking ninja?_ Kame wondered if Deihaka got paid extra for taking on a squad of genin. Ninja in the Hidden Sand were paid amounts calculated off of the difficulty of mission completed. As a result, higher ranks tended to get paid more, because their missions were A-B rank as opposed to genins' C-D rank missions. Bounties were different, a single-sum amount based upon the rank of missing-ninja captured that several lands would pool in for.

Kame thought he knew why Deihaka was so annoyed by his teaching job. "Deihaka-sensei, since you took us on as your pupils, are you getting paid for D-ranks like a rank genin?"

Deihaka looked at him crabbily. "No, but I'm sure as hell not getting paid as much as I used to. Teaching a genin squad is treated as an extended B-Rank mission, so I'm getting paid for that- as opposed to my normal A-Rank or higher. So yeah, I'm having to cut back on the-" he coughed a little bit and reoriented himself. "I mean, I love teaching! I can't get drunk, I can't sleep in, I have to make less money, I'm always worried that I'm gonna teach you the wrong thing, but the..." He visibly forced a smile. "'Joy of Teaching' makes up for it all!" He broke down laughing hysterically.

Then there was an awkward silence, until Fukagaki returned with the second bowl she'd ordered as if he'd known that she'd order it ahead of time. Deihaka took the opportunity to clear his throat and then speak again, on a saner note this time. "Well, team eight, all of you are gathered here, so I have a question. Are you confident in your abilities?"

Kame took a moment to think about that one. "Well, I… It depends on what metric-"

"Yes!" Miriki talked right over him. "I'm totally confident in my abilities. I've earned an A-plus on _every_ mission I've been on-" _He's only been on one mission._ "I finally got my Hatogan stage one unlocked, and I know two different jutsu now!"

Deihaka nodded and turned to Haku. She started a little bit, as if she was confused that he meant her, before responding. "I'm… I think I can probably take on another mission, if that's what you mean. My taijutsu is improving and Shira-sensei said he would think of some new and better ways for me to use my lightning stance… and also teach me something called the Seven Heavens?"

Kame decided to contribute his opinion before Deihaka would ask. "I'm confident that I can do better than before. My puppet jutsu lessons are coming along and my Gale Force Jutsu is down to three seconds of charge-up time."

Deihaka nodded, briefly seeming to think something over, and then turned back to them again. "You all have only been on one mission, but it was at least B-rank and you all held your own. I think… I think you all may be ready."

"For what?" Kame said, thinking _get to the point already, Deihaka-sensei._

"For the chunin exams." _What!?_ Kame was shocked. _We went up against three chunin and I almost died… well, I guess I did take one of them out… but-_ "Don't get me wrong, I don't expect any of you to pass, but I'm making an Executive Teacher Decision that the chunin exams will maybe probably be a good learning experience…" Kame would have been a lot less nervous if his sensei had said that with a little more confidence and without the words Executive Teacher Decision. _He's a lot more inexperienced than he lets on._

Haku's ramen arrived and she started to dig into it, but with an air of desperation Deihaka resumed his speaking. "But anyway, I spoke to Senshiko and she's entering her genin, so I guess it can't hurt for me to do it, too… Besides, the exams might be dangerous, but usually the deaths are kept to a minimum… plus it's a good chance for you all to scope out the top competition from your generation…"

Miriki nodded sagely. "Yes, this seems like a great opportunity to scope out the… competition… I'm sure that there are many gir- I mean, kunoichi that will be a great challenge." _Oh My God, is my chance to participate in the chunin exams going to end up being Miriki's wingman while he hits on our entire generation of genin!?_ Kame watched his dreams of intense competition, difficult challenges, and eventual victory through ingenuity and wit fall apart, replaced by the sight of Miriki being swarmed by girls.

Haku tentatively raised a hand before she spoke. "I… I would like to have another couple of days to train with Shira-sensei… if that's all right?"

Deihaka nodded. "Yeah, it is. You can actually have a couple of weeks, in fact. The chunin exams aren't for another month, and we _will_ take on a few missions before they start, but I just wanted to get a quick snapshot of all of your skills." He turned to Kame. "I also want you to start coming to our morning lessons again if you really have fully learned the Gale Force Jutsu. I have one more that I want to teach you, and you can keep practicing the Gale Force Jutsu until you've mastered it. That goes for you too, Haku, except with you I want to practice… something else."

Haku nodded as the last traces of her second bowl disappeared into her mouth, then started to turn around towards Fukagaki. Before she could order another bowl, Deihaka was waving the man over and pulling out his wallet.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

"This is pretty boring," Miriki complained to the rest of the team. They were walking alongside a merchant's cart, which caused them to move a lot slower than their normal traveling. A simple escort mission to a nearby town was probably going to cost them the entire day.

Deihaka tried to improve their spirits. "Look, not all ninja work is fighting epic battles and saving the day, okay? We all have to start somewhere."

Miriki sighed dramatically. "But this job could probably be taken by non-ninja. Why are we- and more importantly, an A-class jonin like you- wasting time on this crap?"

Deihaka opened and closed his mouth without any sound a few times, finally conceding the point. "I… you know, I don't want to walk miles on end next to a wagon either. I'm not going to defend the system, I'm just here to make sure that you follow it."

Kame, on the other hand, was finding a lot of happiness in the peace of mind that came with this mission. His mind was free to brainstorm as much as it wanted while his feet went on autopilot, and he had a few theories that he was definitely going to to test out when he got home. The walk also proved a chance for him to strengthen his puppet movement, as floating beside him was a large chunk of spare wood that Kankuro had slapped a seal on and given him. By now, his chakra control and reserves were strong enough that holding the wood in place wasn't taxing him to any dangerous lengths.

It had been two weeks since they'd decided on going into the chunin exams, and Kame was making sure to make the most out of every day. When he wasn't working with Kankuro or Deihaka, he was practicing puppetry, ninjutsu, or both. _If I improve enough, maybe Master will even let me take Crow to the chunin exams!_ It was a pretty great thought.

Deihaka was helping him whittle down the Gale Force Jutsu charging time, but was also teaching him another technique: the Wind Barrier Jutsu. It was surprising to Kame the difference between knowing and mastering a Jutsu; he'd managed to cast the Wind Barrier Jutsu on his first attempt but to sustain and control it was another matter entirely. While he'd been training, Miriki and Haku were no less busy. Miriki was practicing Water style, which was a pretty poor tactical move considering that the odds of Sand shinobi being in a battleground with a ready supply of the necessary water were pretty low. Haku, on the other hand, wasn't learning any jutsu at all. Instead, she spent her practice time with Deihaka training her dodging instincts and learning how to evade ninjutsu attacks. Deihaka's highly malleable iron sand was excellent for mimicking various elemental attacks, and she was improving by the day.

During those two weeks, they'd also been on several missions. There were none at the level of their first one, and quite a few that were frankly insulting. Escorts were the most common, but there was also a scattering of other jobs, many of which subverted the Kazekage's screening process to ensure that genin weren't given nanny chores as jobs. Often they'd be disguised or phrased interestingly, like one old woman who'd asked for a squad of genin to watch a prisoner. When they arrived, they found that the prisoner in question was her grandchild, and they they'd been tricked into being babysitters for an afternoon. Genin work was amazingly easy.

Of the four times they'd been called to provide armed escorts, none of their subjects had been attacked. _That might just be because the attacks were called off when they saw the ninja,_ Kame theorized. Then he looked around and scratched off that theory. _Miriki looks stupid, me and Deihaka probably just look bored, and Haku doesn't have any visible weapons or ninja tools. Nobody's calling off an attack because of us… then again, these merchants have been pretty scared, so maybe we do look tough!_ Kame puffed out his chest a little bit, imagining bandits running off at the mere sight of him.

At that moment, in a feat of irony that couldn't possibly just be coincidental, a large group of angry men dressed in black came charging out of the treeline. A couple of arrows whizzed by, but any that would have hit the cart or the people around it were stopped by Deihaka's iron sand. The merchant yelped in fear and ducked inside his cart, yelling out to the ninja, "This is what I paid you for! Get them!"

Kame wondered why they'd failed to notice the bandits, before realizing that the enemies were actually hundreds of feet away and not closing the distance very fast. _Wow, these guys are dumb,_ he thought. _Do they think that they'll manage to win against us from a distance?_ He rapidly folded together a straight-flying paper airplane, took aim… and then dropped his arm. _Damn, they're out of range_. While the paper airplanes were great as a way to get a huge amount of destructive power with a decent amount of control for no chakra cost whatsoever, they did have very limited range.

 _Well then, I guess I'll just have to close the gap_. Kame started to rush forward, performing the handsigns he'd been learning before and channeling his chakra in a swirling pattern around him. Envisioning the pure wind cutting through all before it, his chakra gusted into the physical world as a twisting column of air surrounding him. "Wind Barrier Jutsu!"

He continued his charge, and as the bandits turned to face him, their arrows were knocked aside by the tornado. "What the hell- these shinobi are somethin' else!" he heard one of them mutter, which brought a little grin of pride to his face. Once he was within thirty meters of the attackers, he saw them drop the bows and draw weapons for close-quarters. That left him open to use his weaponry, so he dismissed his Wind Barrier (not a moment too soon; that thing drained a _lot_ of chakra). Seeing the angry bandits closing on him fast, he whipped out two paperbombs and tossed them to the earth in front of him, then readied and threw two more paper airplanes.

For once, the enemy didn't seem to realize what the airplanes did and took them to be ordinary projectile attacks. _Well, I guess that's that,_ thought Kame as he made the snake seal and detonated the planes right in the middle of the enemy force. Cries of anguish came from the resulting smoke cloud, but Kame didn't let down his guard. _Those bombs were made with less chakra than normal, designed to shock and injure rather than kill._

He wanted to disable as many of the bandits as possible without killing them. They hadn't technically harmed him, so he wasn't sure that it was morally right to execute them. _Besides, if I can spare them and I don't, then I killed someone who was weaker than me just because I wanted to,_ Kame thought. _And I know I don't want to be that kind of person._

His overconfidence cost him again, though, when three of them came charging out from within the smoke without a mark on them. _How!?_ Kame had to dart backwards and blow his preliminary defenses, the two paperbombs he'd laid on the ground earlier taking out all three of them. Slightly shaken, he now watched the smoke closely, and as it began to clear out, he saw the walls of earth that had sprung into being and protected the bandits. Most of them had escaped the blasts completely, although an unlucky few who'd been just outside the wall's protection had been downed.

Kame took a quick count of the thieves. There were three on the ground before him, three that had been taken out in the initial blast, and an additional seven left standing. One of the seven, a burly man, was dressed in browns rather than the blacks of the others and had their hands in a sign. When they released it, the walls crumbled away to dust. _Did they hire a shinobi? That must be why the Hidden Sand has been getting so many escort requests lately…_

The man shouted, "Crushing Boulder Jutsu!" Kame, at the last minute, noticed the shadow of something above him. A quick glance skyward revealed that the man had summoned a large chunk of stone a few feet above him, forcing him to find a way to escape. _Alright then, let's do it._ He dropped one of his Windbombs behind him with one hand, and then reached out to the wooden slab still attached to him via chakra thread. _Substitution!_ He swapped places with the wood, which was promptly crushed by the boulder, sending a brief shudder through him when he imagined himself getting caught there. Now ten feet away from where he'd stood, he smirked and made the snake seal.

The Windbomb he'd dropped imploded, but since it was pinned between a literal rock and a hard place all of the force was shunted into the easier to move of the two. The boulder was launched back towards its summoner, who growled in anger and made another sign, dismissing the stone into harmless sand. As he was pelted with the dust fragments, he made the mistake of covering his eyes and turning away a little. That was all Haku needed.

Team Eight's kunoichi swept through the bandits before they could even react, only stopping to become fully visible for the few moments where her fist was swinging forward into the jutsu user's stomach. The blow sank deep into his body and then launched him backwards with an audible snapping noise, sending him flyinb back a good twenty feet before he rolled to a stop. _Well, that one's going to leave a mark,_ thought Kame. _I think that this fight's over._

The remaining six bandits finally seemed to realize what was going on, turning around far too slowly and seeing their ace in the hole flattened. Haku took a threatening step towards them and they immediately folded faster than Kame's paperbombs, falling to the ground in fetal positions and begging for their lives.

Now that the threat was gone, Deihaka stepped away from guarding the cart and walked up to the bandits on the ground. He grabbed the closest one by the hair and lifted them up, all traces of his normal, awkward self gone. "Who else is there? How many people are in your little group?" Even his voice was harsher now. _Is this his personality in battle? I didn't really get to talk with him last time…_ Kame wondered if all the eccentric jonin he'd heard or read about had a serious side.

The bandit, visibly quivering, said, "N- N- Nobody, it's j- just us, I swear!"

Deihaka grunted, dropping the man and turning around to face his team. "Okay, gather what restraints you can and tie them up, we're gonna take them in." Kame nodded and reached into his pack. Although the recommended ninja tools consisted only of a bare minimum of flash paper, kunai, and shuriken, he was never one to hit the bare minimum. After digging through his spare clothing, extra rations, medical kit, spare flash paper, and journal, he finally located the length of rope and lifted it out triumphantly.

He handed it to Deihaka, who quickly cut it into shorter pieces and bound all twelve of the captured bandits. For the larger jutsu user, he visibly put two fingers over the man's throat and then shook his head, stepping back. Haku was beside him in an instant, looking at him worriedly. "Deihaka-sensei? What's wrong, why aren't you binding that one?" Her tone of voice reminded Kame of when his younger self would ask his parents why they were leaving, knowing full well the reason but wanting to ignore it. _I guess if I were the one... if I'd just killed my first person, I don't know how I'd react._

Deihaka looked away from her sadly. "He's… he'd dead, Haku."

She didn't seem to register the words for a few seconds, but after they sank in she looked down at the body, blinking rapidly and slowing her breathing. Kame looked away, not knowing what to do or say. In the end, it was Miriki who walked up to her and put a hand on her shoulder. "Haku, that's not you." _What the hell is he talking about?_ Kame noticed his eyes had changed; the pupils had been replaced with a three-pronged star that stretched across his bright blue irises.

Whatever he said seemed to work, because Haku visibly calmed down a little bit and stepped back from the corpse. She walked back towards the cart, and Miriki followed her. _Are we just going to leave the body here?_ Kame didn't really understand who cleaned up after battles, especially little skirmishes like this one. ' _Clean up'? What am I talking about, this is a corpse of another human, I'm not going to leave it to rot in the sun._ Deihaka walked to the cart with the others, but Kame stayed put. "Guys, I'm going to bury this… umm… I'll catch up, okay?"

Deihaka shrugged. "Make sure that you grab his headband first, though. He might be a missing-ninja, so if Haku want to... claim the... bounty..." He trailed off as he read the situation. _I think I'll take the headband anyway,_ Kame thought. _Even if Haku doesn't want it, it'll do some good for families of this guy's victims if they can get some peace of mind._ Then he chuckled a little bit. _Plus, money is money._

As the other walked off, Miriki didn't even turn around, but Kame saw Haku glance at him with gratitude in her eyes. He turned back the task he'd assigned himself and winced. The man was even bigger up close- luckily, he had a plan for this. He grabbed a kunai and started to dig, making it about three feet deep until he figured it would be enough. Reaching into his pack, he removed three normal-strength bombs and dropped them in, then backed away a good distance and detonated them. A huge plume of earth and dirt shot into the sky, raining down all around the blast point. When he stepped forward to further inspect his handiwork, he saw that a five-foot-wide, four-foot-deep hole had been opened.

The rest of it went by quickly. After grabbing the scratched headband inside the man's pocket, he rolled the body over into the hole as best as he could, then kicked all of the dirt surrounding the grave back into it. While the job wasn't perfect and there was still a depression in the earth, it was as good as it was going to get. _Rest in peace,_ Kame thought. _Wait, am I supposed to say that? Should I be mourning him?_ He hurried off to catch up to the team before he could get any more morally confused.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

"Okay, now stab with the right arm." Kame twitched the correct finger and Crow's arm swung forward as the blade emerged, stabbing into the stomach of the training dummy. "Good, now left." Another finger, another swing. "Poisoned Needle." Kame thought for a split second before sending a flutter of chakra to Crow's head, opening the mouth and releasing a needle that whizzed forward and plunged into the neck of the dummy. "Okay, now roll backwards while stabbing with both arms." _What?_ Kame did his best to roll backwards while maintaining the chakra threads and ordering Crow to attack, but it proved to be too much. While upside-down during the roll he moved the arms the wrong way and Crow simply swiped behind itself.

To add insult to injury, focusing too much on the puppet caused Kame to ungracefully flop out onto his back instead of rolling. Kankuro raised an eyebrow at the display of awkwardness, and Kame hurriedly got up and reattached himself to Crow. Before he could try again, though, his master stopped him.

"Kame, it's late, and you have to depart for the chunin exams tomorrow. Go home, eat, sleep. Another hour of practice won't make any real difference." _I can't believe it. Tomorrow, we leave for the… wait, in that case-_

He glanced at Crow before he could stop himself. Kankuro clearly noticed it, but just stood there, arms crossed, waiting. Kame cleared his throat a little bit, gathering up the nerve to make his request: "Master, can I take- I mean, may I please take Crow to the chunin exams?" He looked down at Kankuro's feet, waiting for a response, but flicked his gaze upwards curiously at the sound of laughter.

Kankuro was laughing at him, and laughing _hard_. Kame could feel his face blushing red as his master wheezed out a few words in between laughs. "You… take Crow… to the…" he dissolved back into laughter. Kame could only stand there and wait for what seemed like forever, until the jonin wiped a few tears from his eyes and seemed to recover enough to make a coherent sentence. "No, you can't _take Crow to the chunin exams_ …"

Sensing another fit of laughter, Kame interjected in his own defense. "Why not? It's not like you'll be using it!"

Kankuro snorted. "And with your level of proficiency, neither will you!" Another round of laughing, and Kame gritted his teeth in frustration. _I'm not that bad… I mean, I couldn't handle rolling while double attacking, but when am I ever going to do that in a…_ He remembered the fight a few days ago, when he'd had to roll backwards and drop a paperbomb at the same time.

"Fine." Kame shook his head, trying not to feel bitter.

"Look, Kame," Kankuro said, "It's not an insult to you or your skills. I just honestly feel that, right now, in a real fight, Crow would _decrease_ your chances of winning. You're just not at the level required to make the chakra and attention costs worth it." _I know that,_ thought Kame. "But… I talked with your squad leader about you entering the chunin exams, and his explanation of it being a chance for you to practice did change my mind slightly. When I was a genin, the chunin exams were cutthroat, but I understand things have… loosened up a little bit since then."

Kame nodded along, unsure where his master was going with this. Kankuro's eyes briefly drifted off in remembrance of something, but then snapped back to the subject at hand. "So… oh, yeah. If you are to practice against other ninja, I want you to see what the basics of puppet jutsu feel like, at least. That's why I put together a new puppet for the task."

Kankuro turned around and picked up a moderately-sized object from the workbench behind him. When it was brought into the light, Kame could see it more clearly: It was small, maybe one foot from end to end, and had a curving body that ended with a larger head carved to look like an insect's, with pincers and a hole where the mouth was. Two wings extended from the back, two pairs bent wooden legs ending in metal blades were embedded in the front, and its tail ended in a larger metal blade. "This is Wasp," Kankuro said proudly.

He went on to explain all of Wasp's details and hidden weapons. A mechanism within the body fed needles to a launcher in the mouth. The legs could be fired off as weapons but not controlled separately, as they were too small to accommodate the necessary chakra receptors. The wings would act as stabilizers to keep it from accidentally flipping or getting flung away.

Kame swallowed as he looked at the thing. _It's not what I imagined, but…_ he thought about it for a few seconds before letting himself smile widely. "Thanks, master!" He accepted the Wasp and broke it down into its component parts to help with moving it, before leaving for his home. _I can make this work…_

When he woke up the next morning, neither packing his things nor a quick breakfast helped settle his riled nerves. He stuffed a few new ninja tools into his new pack, all bought with the ransom money that Haku hadn't wanted. The man she'd killed was called Korisa the Boulder, a D-Rank missing ninja who'd never passed the chunin exams and had left the Hidden Stone Village after his fourth failure. He'd popped up around the lands, working as a mercenary-for-hire, and had killed a few people in the process. Haku had brightened up a little bit at that, perhaps alleviating some of the moral weight from her shoulders.

After one last check to make sure he had everything, including the component parts of Wasp, he walked downstairs to see his parents there. "Come here, son!" His father opened his arms for a hug, which Kame gave him, then his mother joined in. After a few moments, his dad pushed him back to smile and meet his gaze. "I'm so proud of you, heading off to the chunin exams only months after becoming a genin!"

Kame futilely tried to keep the blood from rushing to his cheeks. "Thanks, dad." In that moment, he briefly forgot the butterflies in his stomach, but after leaving his house they returned in force. _The chunin exams... there's a reason that people treat chunin and genin so differently. Sure, the mortality rate has gone down with the years, but young ninja have gotten significantly stronger. With the ninja wars gone, people can afford to spend more time teaching children the basics and letting them forge their own style, rather than prepare them for combat before they're even fifteen. The villages have shared far more information, which means that education everywhere has improved. That means that my chunin exams will..._ a chill ran down his spine. _I might have a more difficult time of it than Naruto, Sasuke, and Gaara did._

His anxiety ran more and more rampant, eating away at the false confidence that had been there the previous night at Kankuro's workshop. For once, he walked to the team meeting place rather than running. Upon his arrival, Deihaka, Miriki, and Haku were all already there, having shown up early. When they saw him, their shouted greetings were the things that finally got rid of his nervousness.


	11. Arc 2 Vol 1: The Chunin Exams

**Ninja Profile: Sagino Kokuseki**

Ninjutsu: B  
Genjutsu: D  
Taijutsu: B  
Specialties: Stone Bond, Resilience, Stamina

Description: Sagino stands taller than most girls her age, built more solidly too. She wears the normal grey vest of a Valley shinobi over a grey shirt and shorts. Her sandy brown hair is long and messy, and she shares the same bright blue eyes as her sibling, Gunaji. Her attitude of general annoyance is prevalent in her mannerisms and voice, but when she's happy it goes away.

Origin: Since her childhood, Sagino wanted to live a normal, happy life and settle down to a normal job. However, as she grew, her brother Gunaji focused intensely on life as a shinobi, and worry for him caused Sagino to follow him into that life. As she grew more and more skilled as a ninja, she scared off most of the boys in her village, while simultaneously garnering more and more support from her clan on this new course. As time dragged on, she eventually gave in and accepted that her future would be to follow her brother along the path of the shinobi.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Kame's first thought upon entering the Village Hidden in the Leaves was, _Is this really all there is to it?_ Honestly, on the several-day-long journey over, he'd probably been building it up it in his mind- no, the overselling had started a long time ago, when he'd first begun reading about Naruto Uzumaki. _I'd been preparing myself to deal with a bit of disappointment, but… I mean, come on._ The Village Hidden in the Sand looked a hundred times more… well… powerful. The Leaf had a small border wall far outside the actual village as its only visible defense.

 _Then again, we did lose an offensive war to them,_ Kame considered. _I think I'm going to keep an eye out as to how that happened._ His attentions were yanked back to the task at hand by a middle-aged woman approaching them with intent in her stride. As she got closer, he got a better look at her. She was blonde, her hair in four sections flaring out behind her head, and had a huge fan on her back.

 _Oh, it's Lord Kazekage's sister. Temari?_ Kame had only heard stories about the other sibling of Lord Gaara before, as she'd moved to the Leaf long before he'd been born. Was she greeting the incoming team because of her past with the Sand? As she closed the last couple of steps, she waved a hand at them and smiled. "Hey, Deihaka and Deihaka's genin."

Miriki got a mischievous look on his face that spoke volumes about what he was about to try to do. Kame briefly remembered that Temari had moved to the Leaf because of a _marriage_ and elbowed his teammate to prevent him from flirting with the sister of the Kazekage. Before Miriki could make another attempt, Deihaka replied to her with a familiarity that belied some history he hadn't told them. "Hey, Temari. It's been a while, eh?"

She nodded. "Yeah… I was wondering if you were going to show up to the exams. You were slated to get here yesterday."

Deihaka froze. "Is today not the fifteenth?"

Temari shook her head. "No, it's the sixteenth." A slow smile crept across her face at Deihaka's rapidly widening eyes. "But, that still gives you… thirteen minutes to show up before the chunin exams start." Deihaka stood completely frozen, paling rapidly, and Kame wondered if maybe he'd had a heart attack. Temari, still smiling widely, jerked her head towards a large building at the end of the long street. "Go on, you can make it. Probably."

Deihaka finally seemed to get back to reality and wheezed out, "Executive Teacher Decision! Go. Go! Go!" He sprinted off in the other direction, followed immediately by Haku. Kame shrugged before chasing after him as well, leaving Miriki to decide whether he wanted to participate in the exam or in the Hidden Leaf dating scene.

When they reached the building, Deihaka didn't even slow, charging straight through the doorway panting like a madman. By the time Kame caught up, he'd already filled out two pages of a four-page document. He finished the other two in a matter of seconds and then slammed it in front of Kame. "Sign… here… please…"

Kame did as he was told, a little bit put off by Deihaka's reaction. _Then again, if I was in charge of a squad of genin and missed an entire day… I don't think I'd take it very well, either._ After Haku signed, Miriki came through the door and gave his own signature, brooding in annoyance. Deihaka all but threw the papers at the poor receptionist, snatched a small pile of three cards, and handed them to the three genin before pointing them to a flight of stairs. "Okay, here's your testing identification numbers. You all are great and I believe in you, blah blah blah, now go!"

The team eight genin shared a glance at each other before starting up the steps. As they walked away, Miriki muttered under his breath but loud enough for Kame to hear, "Gee, thanks for the encouraging words, sensei."

At the end of the stairs was a large door to their right with a sign that said "Chunin Exams" over it. Kame, somehow having ended up in front of the other two, started forwards toward it, but then froze in hesitation. _After this, it's all-out competition against ninja from other lands. There's no more room for training or messing up. I'm… Can I really do this? What if-_

Miriki tapped him on the shoulder, stepping forward with the three-pointed star in his eyes. "Relax, Kame, we're going to be fine. You aren't going to fail and even if you do, it won't be an embarrassment for the whole village." Kame felt himself flush at the comforting words from someone who annoyed him so much and, anxious to escape the situation, pushed open the door.

Inside the room sat a large number of groups of people, seemingly clumped up by nation. Turning over to the Hidden Sand side, Kame felt a rush of mixed emotions as he recognized one of the teams: Tetsute, Rakuyo, and Genji were leaning against the wall, with the former looking at him with derision. There were two more teams from the sand, but they were composed of older generation genin that Kame didn't know at all.

"Hey, Miriki!" _Oh, no, please…_ Keikiro was smiling and waving from the center of the room, sitting next to her teammates Gunaji and Sagino. _So the Valley sent their genin like Deihaka said they would._ Rather than watch Miriki slide over and flirt with her, Kame scanned the rest of the room briefly, looking for clan crests that he could recognize. There were seemingly only minor ones that he didn't know, until his eyes made it to the corner of the room with the Leaf shinobi.

Standing in a group of three were genin bearing the Uchiha, Hyuga, and Namikaze clan crests. _That's… all three, on one team!?_ Kame tried not to stare, but the Uchiha noticed his glance and turned to face him with cold eyes. She was maybe a little shorter than he was, clad in red kunoichi wear and with long dark hair and eyes. _Is this the heir to the Leaf's most infamous clan?_

Their silent staring contest broke down when a door at the other end of the room slammed open just as the door on the near side slammed shut. In the doorway stood a tired-looking man wearing what looked like Leaf jonin uniform, if Kame remembered correctly. He took in the room, eyes lingering briefly on the Uchiha's squad, and then drawled out in a lazy voice, "Okay, applicants, it's time for the written exam. Come on in here and take the seat with your number, and then I can explain how it'll work."

He stepped aside to reveal what looked like a massive classroom, with several long rows of desks and chairs all facing a front blackboard. Lines of ninja wearing Leaf chunin clothing spread across the left and right walls, each of which held a clipboard. The various genin shuffled through the door, and Kame watched Haku and Miriki take their seats, finding himself the one with his number, 99, on it. It was in the far left and back in the corner. After everyone had found their spots, the man continued. "My name is Shikadai Nara, and I'll be your written exam administrator. If you all would look in the drawers of your desks, there's a piece of paper and a pen. Please take them out." _Huh, so this is the son of Lady Temari. He does not look like her at all…_

Kame reached into the drawer and did as he'd been told, placing the sheet of paper and pen onto the desk in front of him. An immediate scan of the paper before him revealed it to be a written test; exactly what he'd expected. _Wow, this is… really exactly what I expected…_ the two-sided sheet of paper had twenty questions, evenly split between calculations, ninjutsu knowledge, and ninja history. _Huh, I somehow thought the chunin exams would be more… I don't know, surprising?_

Shikadai let out another long sigh, bringing the genins' eyes back over to him. "Okay, genin, you may begin the test. However, the people along the walls _will_ be monitoring you, and after they catch you cheating for the second time, you will be disqualified from the exam, along with your team." Kame considered that, but looking back down at the test he could probably do it all without cheating. Since he was in a back row, raised above most of the class, he was safe from people copying his answers.

 _Okay then, let's do this. Question one: Name all five sitting Kage during the Great Shinobi War._ That one was easy: The fourth Raikage, A, the fifth Kazekage, Gaara, the fifth Hokage, Tsunade, the third Tsuchikage, Onoki, and the fifth Mizukage, Terumi. _Haku and Miri- I mean, Haku at least can probably get that one._ Kame could vividly remember Miriki spending most of the history lessons explaining to one female classmate or another why he was a hundred times more attractive than any Kage.

The next question was about jutsu. _Name all five elemental changes of nature and five possible kekkegenkai that spring from a combination of two of them._ _Is this a joke?_ Chunin weren't held to a very high standard of academics, it seemed. Kame quickly wrote down the answer: Earth, Fire, Wind, Lightning, and Water; with the Wood, Magnet, Boil, Scorch, and Ice releases as the kekkegenkai.

The rest of the test was just as simple, with none of the questions pushing him anywhere out of his comfort zone. When he finished, a quick glance at the clock told him that it had taken him all of twelve minutes. _How long am I going to be waiting here?_ Kame wondered. _Maybe if I'm done anyway, I may as well see how the rest of the squads are doing._

When he looked around, he saw that many of the other contestants were still bent down over the desks in concentration. Little grunts of annoyance or noises of confusion revealed that people were in fact having trouble with the tests. Kame realized that the purpose of the chunin lining the walls was to watch for the inevitable attempts to cheat when thinking didn't work. _This situation was made to force people to either have great intelligence and answer all of the questions right, or great ingenuity and cheat without getting caught_.

An older chunin in the second row bobbed his head to the side for the third time since Kame'd started watching him, and it must have been one too many for the chunin watching him as well. The watcher pointed at him and barked, "Applicant thirteen! Disqualified!" Before the man could protest, another two numbers were shouted. "Applicants fourteen and fifteen! Also disqualified! All of you leave, now."

The man seemed to look around in desperation, but had no choice but to walk out of the room, followed by two clearly disappointed teammates. _That's not going to be me,_ thought Kame. _But- Haku and Miriki, can they pass this test? I think Haku could probably get all of the ninja history questions, but Miriki I don't know about. The calculations were… I mean, I could deal with them, but those weren't taught at the academy, so I doubt they're going to get it. That leaves the jutsu section… Haku hasn't ever used a jutsu, and there's questions about chakra movement theory. She's probably in over her head._

Kame considered the situation and spared a glance at Haku's back. She was bent over her paper, focused on it, but not writing anything, which was a bad sign. He thought about what to do. _If she fails this test, then we'll be at a disadvantage for the rest of the tournament- no, wait, if the applicants get caught cheating, then their whole team gets disqualified. That implies that they need full teams later in the exams, so it's possible that me and Miriki will get flunked if she fails._

He thought and thought, and finally remembered the rules of the exam. Applicants could only be punished if they were caught cheating _twice_. With that in mind, he grabbed a paper bomb from his pocket, copied his answers onto the back of it, and balled it up. _It all comes down to this,_ he thought, a smile creeping onto his face at the absurdity of the situation. _Our chunin exam results resting on one throw of a piece of paper_. Calming his mind, he settled himself, took aim, and then threw.

The paper ball flew in an arc across the classroom and landed on the table in front of Haku, exactly where he'd aimed it. Haku leaped a little bit in her seat before bending forward to check what it was, unfolding it and seeing the writing on it, as well as his brief explanation. She whipped around to look at him and he waved at her, before leaning back nonchalantly. She then turned back to the tests and began writing again.

Kame's smile widened as he saw the chunin nearest to him narrowing their eyes. He'd clearly and intentionally cheated, but they couldn't punish him because it was the first time. Now Haku was definitely going to pass, leaving Miriki the only unsure variable in the equation. When he turned back to the class, it seemed that nobody had noticed his little stunt. A few confused glances were tossed his way, but the other genin for the most part seemed to write it off as something unimportant.

A few minutes and four more disqualified squads later, Shikadai stood back up at the front of the class and cleared his throat. What little writing still happening stopped, and he spoke. "Alright, genin,there's another rule that I haven't explained yet, so listen up. To pass this exam, you have to have answered eighteen or more of the twenty questions right." A wave of mutters and gasps spread through the classroom. "Now, there's two ways for you to submit your tests. First, you can turn it in as normal, get your personal grade, and pass or fail off of that. If you want to do this, you will mark the top of your paper with a 'one'."

 _Then what's the other option?_ "The other method is to share with your teammates. If you mark your paper with a 'two' then your score will be divided by three and then added to a cumulative team score for all of the people who wrote 'two's. If all three of you choose to do so, then the resulting team score will be a perfect average of your scores. However, if one of you opts out, then it's impossible to pass, so choose your course very carefully."

 _Crap,_ Kame thought. _With that math, assuming me and by extension Haku both got perfect scores, and we were to average the team's scores, then we still fail if Miriki got seven or more questions wrong. Besides, there's no guarantee that both of them will go to average scores. Miriki might be too proud…_ "Pass up your tests, now."

 _Time's up,_ thought Kame. _I'm afraid this might be a bad choice, but… so far we've been pushed to do things as a team, so…_ He marked the paper with a 'two' and passed it to the chunin walking up their column. When all the papers had been taken, he noticed Miriki glancing at him with the star eyes, smirking. Shikadai turned to the class and nodded. "Congratulations on making it this far. You're all either intelligent, clever, or brave- but all of those things can only carry you so far. Remain here while we grade your tests."

The proctor disappeared into a door at the front of the room, followed by most of the chunin. A few remained behind, though, and their presence dampened spirits enough to keep the classroom silent. Seconds dragged on into minutes, Kame growing more and more nervous with each tick of the clock's hands, looking around at the other students who had varying expressions on their faces. The genin ranged from serene to terrified to smirking like Miriki, and Kame couldn't get a good read on how the rest of them had felt.

Finally, the door opened again, and Shikadai walked back in with a single piece of paper in his hands. Turning to face the class once again, he looked at the sheet and then at the applicants. "The following participants had insufficient scores, either due to wrong answers or incomplete participation in the shared score. Applicants one, two, four, eight, nine, thirteen…" He kept going, dismissing a good half of the remaining genin, who sullenly stood and exited when their numbers were called.

Shikadai finally smiled, a full smile that reminded Kame a little bit too much of Naziru's expression when she thought about torturing him. "And the following applicants received satisfactory scores, but wrote ones on their papers. Numbers two, three, fourteen…" Shikadai finished up with the long list of people, smile still present. "You all fail. Leave the room to catch up with your squadmates." A general uproar was silenced immediately by the smile turning to a glare, and his voice losing its boredom to transform to an authoritative bark. "All of you put your personal success before the squad and failed to believe in your squadmates, which chunin simply do not do. I told you that intelligence would only carry you so far, and it's true- in the ninja world, you will need to believe in your squad and vice versa. Get out of my sight, now."

Another huge swath of people stomped out, leaving the room with only maybe thirty genin. Kame saw Miriki and Haku still present, the stress momentarily clearing as he realized they they'd all passed the written exam. As the last failed contestant left the room, the doors were slammed shut and Shikadai's smile came back. "As for the rest of you, you all pass! Congratulations, you thirty genin are now one step closer to becoming chunin, which is more than I can say for sixty-nine of your peers."

 _Yes!_ Kame let himself grin, elated at the knowledge that team eight had survived a third of the exams. Others shouted, fist-pumped, or simply laid back in relief, and Shikadai stood silently while the hubbub winded down. Eventually, the room was quiet enough for him to finish his speech. "You ten teams will now proceed out this door," he said, pointing towards an exit at the front right of the room, "and go straight down the steps. Once you reach the door to the outside courtyard, go through it, and you'll be given a half-hour to eat, talk, or do whatever you have to in preparation for stage two of your chunin exam. Good luck."

Everyone seemed to take their cue and move forward, filing through the door in no particular order. As the furthest one from the door, Kame ended up as the last in the line and by the time he made it down the stairs and out the door at the end, most of the other genin had already spread out and found their teammates. His own teammates walked up to him, equally huge smiles on their faces, but Haku spoke first. "Kame, we did it!"

Kame smiled back at her. "Yeah, we did…"

Miriki continued smiling, but it his expression turned right past Kame to settle on something across the courtyard. He nodded at the other two team eight members and said distractedly, "Yeah, woohoo, great job team! Can you excuse me for just one moment?" Without even waiting for a response he walked off towards whatever had captured his attentions.

Kame rolled his eyes, rotating around to check out who Miriki had set his sights on _this_ time, but his nonchalance about it evaporated instantly once he saw who it was. _Miriki is… he's… that's…_ Kame could only run to catch up but didn't make it in time, and was only able to watch as his teammate approached the Uchiha heir.

"Hey there, gorgeous." The girl turned to look at him without any emotion showing. "You can turn off your Sexy No Jutsu now."

"What?" She was staring at him like scum from the bottom of her shoe.

He feigned surprise. "What? You mean you _aren't_ using illusory jutsu to look that attractive?" She narrowed her eyes, but he was either oblivious or still hopeful. "Then you can at least apologize for using tsukoyomi on me; I just lost three whole days staring into your eyes."

One of the girl's teammates, a slightly smaller-than-average boy wearing a white shirt and pants, grabbed her arm. "Naruko, ignore this creep, let's-" She threw off his arm, knocking him back a little bit and giving Kame a good look at his face. He had the pale white eyes that suggested a Hyuga heritage, short, straight brown hair, and an expression of anxiety.

"Shut up, Sureki, this guy's annoying me. And you," she said, turning to Miriki, "hop off, pervert." Naruko wore an expression of extreme distaste as she turned her gaze once more, from Miriki to Kame. "Is this your teammate? He was staring at me earlier, too. If you have something to say, then say it."

Kame shook his head. "I didn't mean any insult; I've just read a lot about your clan and-"

She turned away from him, apparently deciding the conversation was over. Shrugging, Kame turned around to walk back to where Haku was, dragging Miriki along with him. "Miriki, dude, you have to learn when- or, _who_ , I guess- not to hit on. Married sister of the Kazekage? Bad idea. Powerful clan heir that you barely know? Bad idea."

Miriki sighed. "The secret to success with woman is to never know when to quit. I wouldn't expect someone like you who's never even been on a date to get that, but just leave me to my art, would you?"

 _Well, that's pretty creepy,_ thought Kame. When they reached Haku, he let go of Miriki and sat down with legs crossed. Reaching into his pack, he found the food he'd packed that morning and pulled it out. In between bites, he considered the other squads in the courtyard. Tetsute's squad had passed, but besides them and team 8 no other Hidden Sand teams were present. There were two Leaf teams, a group of maybe third or fourth year genin and the Uchiha's group. Two teams from the Cloud, two teams from the Stone, and one team from the Mist brought the count up to nine, leaving the last team being… _Oh, there they are,_ Kame thought as he looked to a back corner of the courtyard and recognized the Valley genin that they knew.

Keikiro seemed to recognize them at the same time, because she squealed and darted over. "Hey, guys, how's it going? That test was really something, huh? I knew that I had to trust my teammates, though, I mean, what's the point of having a squad if you're not gonna trust them with things?"

Miriki brightened up. "You can trust _me_ with things, Keikiro." A casual smirk split his face, already having recovered from the awkwardness with Naruko. "Maybe I could trust you?" Keikiro blushed a little bit and turned away. "Can I trust you to come to a victory dinner with me tonight?" She nodded furiously.

 _Well, we have to pass now,_ thought Kame sarcastically. _His date is ruined if we don't._ Sagino and Gunaji walked up, both still eating lunches as they sat down. In between bites, Gunaji asked, "How were the last couple of weeks? Anything big happen?"

Kame shook his head. "Nothing much. We trained a lot, though." A thought occurred to him. "Hey, Gunaji, can I ask you something?"

"Go ahead."

Kame remembered the way he'd fought back during the first mission, by moving around sharpened stones through the air. "Do you use puppet jutsu to move those rocks, or what?"

The Valley genin nodded. "No... I mean, I'm not using chakra threads, if that's what you're asking. It's not something you can learn, it's a kekkegenkai." _His tone makes it sound like he doesn't want to say any more._

Miriki sat straight up. "Oh, yeah! I just remembered what I was going to say to you guys earlier! I never explained my kekkegenkai to you, didn't I?" Kame shook his head, curious now about what it did. "The Hatogan, it's a two-part kekkegenkai that has a visual and dojutsu component. I've unlocked three of the nine aspects." _The star in his eye has three points,_ thought Kame.

"So, anyway, the aspects come at different points for different people, but if they can access it completely, the result is the same. Our clan genjutsu, it isn't like most, where you trap someone inside of a vision within their mind by through one of their five senses. We actually target and change the senses, meaning that the victim can still move and act. However, it's a _lot_ easier to use, and slightly more difficult to break. Five of the nine aspects are the five senses."

"So which ones have you gotten access to, then?" Kame asked, surprised that Miriki had been concealing such a powerful bloodline trait this whole time.

Miriki responded with surprising hesitance. "Uhh… the thing is… Okay, so I can hit two senses."

"And they are?" Kame had a bad feeling all of a sudden.

"Taste and smell," Miriki muttered.

 _Taste and smell. Well, that's going to be super useful,_ thought Kame bitterly. _Of course he ends up with the two most useless ones._ "Well, I mean… you said that you had _three_ aspects? What's the third one?"

Miriki pointed at his eyes. "I can see people's fears." Then he cringed a little bit at what he'd said and shook his head. "I mean, I can't perpetually see everything a person's afraid of, but if they're particularly afraid of something at any given point I can sort of just understand it. That's why I was able to know that I should write the two on my test in there, both of you were _terrified_ that I wasn't going to."

 _That's a lot more useful,_ Kame thought. _Wait, that explains how he's known exactly what to say to me and Haku whenever we've gotten nervous over the last couple of days.._. Kame finished his food and put the packaging back into his bag, seeing Haku had already done the same. Gunaji ended up being the one who responded to Miriki's explanation. "Are you sure you want us to hear you explain all this? We are shinobi from another village…"

Miriki shrugged. "I mean, you haven't given me any reason to hide things from you, and the Valley hasn't ever been an enemy to the Sand, so…" His eyes drifted over to Keikiro. "Besides, me and Keikiro just had a very important conversation about trust." The look they gave each other after that line made Kame a little bit sick, and he had to look away.

When he turned back around, there were three more genin standing next to their group of six. A light-skinned and wide-smiling shinobi was out front, waving at them despite being literally two feet away. "Hey, guys, what's going on over here?" His voice was nearly as absurdly happy as Keikiro's.

Keikiro must have recognized her kindred spirit, because she was the one who responded. "Oh, nothing much, we're just hanging out. Want to join? Where are you from; are you Hidden Cloud genin?" _I mean, they're all three wearing Cloud headbands and a lot of white, so they're either Cloud ninja or people who killed and impersonated Cloud ninja._

The happy one nodded enthusiastically. "Soon to be Hidden Cloud chunin, actually!"

Another member of his squad rolled their eyes. This one was another boy, with brown hair and eyes, taller than normal and built with a lot of muscle. When he spoke, it was in a voice that seemed too deep for his age. "Don't you think you're calling that a little soon, Kosu?"

'Kosu' spun around to insult his teammate, "Ah, you're just a downer." Then he spun again, facing back towards their little group. "He's just a downer, don't mind him. My name is Kosu Iburi, Mr. Grumpy is Dako Nakimoka, and the quiet one is Zandeina Ryukana." The third Cloud ninja, Zandeina, was a kunoichi clad in a long coat, hood pulled over her head and blocking most of her face.

Kame thought that he should probably return the courtesy of introduction. "My name is Kame Hakiara, this is Miriki Kosuki to my left, and on my right is Haku. We're all Hidden Sand genin."

Keikiro introduced her whole squad as well, and then the Cloud shinobi sat down and they broke down into casual conversation. After a few minutes of silence, Kame decided he should probably participate in the talking, which was how he found himself speaking with the imposing Dako. "What's the Hidden Cloud like?" _Ouch, that was awkward._

Dako spared him a glance that clearly said, _Really?_ "What kind of question is that? It's a village, where I live and work. It's in the mountains."

 _I didn't train myself in conversation-making, okay?_ Kame's wish for the conversation to be over was granted by a man suddenly appearing in the middle of the courtyard. _What!? Is that? No; it can't be, he's way too young._ The man, probably in his late twenties or early thirties, stood up with perfect posture, wearing a green jumpsuit and two orange leg-warmers. Not only his outfit, but also his bowl cut and huge eyebrows all matched the pictures and descriptions that Kame had read of Rock Lee.

The Rock Lee lookalike opened his mouth and called out to the assembled genin. "Greeting! I am Metal Lee, your instructor for… for the…" He trailed off, shuddering a little bit, looking around at all the people surrounding him. "I will lead you in… the second part of the chunin exams." _What's wrong with this guy?_ Kame was perplexed by the man's actions. He'd started out confident, but now he was uttering stilted sentences and looking like he'd rather be anywhere else. _Does he have... stage fright?_

"Come on, Lee-sensei!" The Namikaze genin shouted words of encouragement, which seemed to finally snap Metal Lee out of it.

"Yes. Yes! I will take you to the place of testing! Follow me!" Metal Lee turned around and marched off, leaving all of the genin to scramble around trying to pack up. He was already a good couple hundred meters away by the time participants started off after him, sprinting to catch up. Kame, having already packed up his food, waited for Miriki to clean up and then led his two squadmates on into their next challenge.


	12. Arc 2 Vol 2: The Second Stage

**(A/N) Does anyone know if Darui has a last name? I couldn't find anything on it, so I'm making one up and running with it until further notice.**

 **Ninja Profile: Zandeina Ryukana**

Ninjutsu: A  
Genjutsu: B  
Taijutsu: B  
Specialties: Storm Release, Speed, Capturing

Description: Zandeina has the light hair and dark skin of many in the Hidden Cloud, although her eyes are a piercing green. Despite usually wearing a large, heavy cloak to cover herself, she is highly demanding and outspoken in casual conversation. She constantly and clearly looks down on those around her and fights with a casualness borne of believing opponents to be unworthy of facing her.

Origin: Zandeina is the prodigy daughter of the fifth Raikage, and from a young age her talents developed extremely quickly. As she grew up surrounded by praise and people pushing her to do better and better, she started to believe in herself being better than all around her. Her pride and training pushed her into an early graduation from the academy, but after receiving a genin squad leader who she didn't get along with, it took her three years to earn the privilege of taking the chunin exams.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

After exiting the courtyard out into the woods surrounding the Leaf and walking at least a couple of kilometers, Metal Lee finally stopped in front of a mountain well outside the village. He whirled around, hands on his hips, and pointed at the mountain behind him. "This is the second stage of the chunin exam!" _What._ Kame really wished that people in charge of him would be more clear with their instructions. Evidently the proctor realized his error, because he hastily tried again. "The second stage of the chunin exam will take place on this mountain!"

 _Okay, better,_ thought Kame. However, as seconds ticked by, an awkward cough sealed in the realization that Metal Lee was finished talking. "Umm, Lee-sensei?" Again, the Namikaze genin seemed to steer Metal in the right direction.

"Ah, yes, my apologies. For the second part of the chunin exams, there are exactly thirty special tokens scattered about on the summit of this mountain. It will be your job to climb to the top and secure them! Re-entering the courtyard with tokens will end the test for you and your team's score will be equal to the number of tokens you managed to collect." _Okay, so it's a race with a tactical element thrown in_ , Kame considered. _He said that entering the courtyard ends the test, which means that on the way back the test is still going._

Sagino raised a hand and Lee nodded at her. "So, what's the minimum score required to pass? And do we have to defend ourselves from the other participants?"

Metal immediately responded. "There is no minimum score! Once all teams have finished, or after forty-eight hours, the five highest scoring teams will be admitted into the finals." _F_ _orty-eight hours!? There's no way that the mountain could take that long to climb._ "As for the rules surrounding attacking the other participants… you are free to use whatever weapons and jutsu you are able to. However, injuring or killing another participant will be punished severely, possibly even with a lifetime ban from taking the chunin exams."

Kame nodded, trying not to focus on the fact that he'd brought up killing as a possible and even predictable outcome. Looking around at the other participants, none of them looked like murderers… _Haku's a murderer,_ some nasty voice in his head reminded him. _It's different, she was on a job and the guy was trying to kill people,_ he justified back.

Metal then pointed to the sides. "The fence around this mountain has several gateways, all of which are monitored and controlled remotely. They are numbered starting with the one behind me, number one, through number ten to my left." He reached into a pocket and pulled out a piece of paper, reading off of it. "When the gates open, you are free to go. Now, applicants ninety-seven, ninety-eight, and ninety-nine, you will remain here. Applicants forty, forty-one, and forty-two, go to gate two…" As he numbered off the gates, Kame took careful note and assembled a mental map of the teams.

The Leaf squads were adjacent in positions nine and ten, meaning that they'd be starting close to team eight. To the right was the sole Mist team, and then in counterclockwise order were teams from the cloud, stone, the cloud team that they'd spoken to, another stone team, Tetsute's team, and the Valley team. Kame yanked his backpack off and removed all of Wasp's parts, assembling it as rapidly as he could.

While he was concentrated on his task, a loud voice crackled to life through the overhead intercom. "Greeting, genin! It is I, Metal Lee, still your instructor! The entirety of the training ground is monitored, so we can watch and understand your performance. However, we will _only_ step in if there is a situation that could threaten a participant's life or permanent injury."

Kame finished the last leg of Wasp and made the chakra thread, lifting it from the ground. He'd had a couple of chances to practice during the journey to the Leaf, and he had to admit that Kankuro had been right. The smaller puppet was significantly easier to use and would actually be a great asset in any fights they had. Haku, noticing that he was done, spoke up. "Kame, how are we going to play this? Do we just rush straight to the top, or should we try to steal the tokens from other teams?"

Kame thought about it for a second. _Metal Lee didn't explain what the tokens were going to be, did he? That means that they could be something incredibly easy or incredibly difficult to steal. We can't put all of our eggs in the stealing basket._ He glanced at Haku, and then at Miriki, considering the situation. _But I don't know if we can win a race, either. Miriki isn't very fast, and if we leave at the same time as the other teams, we'll probably get there after them. That means we'll have to walk into a trap._

 _Wait- if all of the teams are heading to the top at their different speeds, then nobody can set a trap! They'd have to defend from all angles, sorely outnumbered._ Kame turned to face his teammates. "We're just gonna go straight for the top, but slow down once we get close and make sure that we know what we're walking into…"

Haku nodded, but Miriki raised an eyebrow. "So we're just going straight into the war zone? Who made you leader, huh?" _Oh my god, now is not the time for a power struggle, Miriki._

Haku, completely straight-facedly, said, "Let's put it to a vote."

Miriki looked at her, then at Kame, and then back again, and rolled his eyes. "Fine, let's go with Kame's plan."

Kame nodded, grateful for Haku's support. "Okay then, if we do run into another team, let's talk about what to do. I think we should immediately back off and formulate a plan of attack or retreat. If they get the drop on us, we have to scatter, in which case we would need to meet back up. Let's say our meeting point is… back here?" The other two nodded. "Good. In fights, what we do is going to change drastically depending on the abilities of our enemies, but in general I feel like our job should be keeping them on their heels and unfocused until Haku can close in to beat them in melee."

They both nodded, and Haku opened her mouth to respond, but at that moment, the gate opened and a loud buzzer sounded out over the intercom. The three of them immediately nodded to each other and charged off into the forest, but remained on the ground. As much as Kame had heard and read about ninja using the branches to leap through the woods, he hadn't had much of an opportunity to practice it, having grown up in a desert. He could attempt it for the first time, but that seemed like a terrible idea- _The middle of the chunin exams, surrounded by enemy teams, is not the best place to learn new things._

Then he remembered something and snorted. Without breaking pace, Haku turned slightly to look at him. "Kame? What is it, what's so funny?"

"It's just…" Kame rolled his eyes. "Deihaka entered us in this exam in the first place as a 'learning experience'..." Haku giggled a little bit and Miriki cracked a smile. _Learning experience my ass._ Not for the first time, Kame thought about their sensei's inexperience. _Why did he agree to take on a team of genin, anyway? He's a very new jonin, and he clearly doesn't enjoy or have any talent for teaching._

They reached the base of the mountain and began making their way up through treacherous rocks, finding a path by hopping or climbing from ledge to ledge. Wasp still hovered right around Kame's head, and he made sure to keep it ready to intercept an attack if necessary. It was no Salamander and would probably break under any serious damage, but a broken puppet was better than disqualification or injury.

They scaled the mountain even faster than he'd thought they would. After only maybe twenty minutes, they'd already neared the top of it. _Why would we need forty-eight hours for this?_ He heard the sounds of battle from ahead and raised a hand to indicate that they should slow down, then crept forward very carefully, readying a Gale Force Jutsu just in case he'd need a hasty escape.

He finally peeked his head around a rock to see the flattened top of the mountain, on which a small battle was taking place. From what he could gather, it looked like the two Stone teams had reached the tokens first and were trying to defend them, obviously not having thought through how that was going to end up. Both Cloud teams and the Mist team were surrounding and trading attacks and jutsu with them, gradually wearing them down.

 _Okay,_ Kame considered, _how are we going to play this? If we wait for the Cloud and Mist to win, then they might take all of the tokens._ Looking more carefully, he noticed that the stone clearing had a pile of metal bars in the middle, cylinders perhaps eight inches long and three inches wide. _Nevermind, they'll never be able to carry that much. Doing the math, as long as we take…_ He thought about it for a moment. Thirty total tokens divided by five winning teams would equal six, leaving twenty-four to be taken by the others. Even if those twenty-four _were_ split evenly among four other teams, those four would equal team eight in score. _In that case, we need to take six of them to guarantee ourselves a spot in the top five._

At that moment, he saw Tetsute's team emerge and attack the Mist team from behind. _Okay, now the battle's even, so we should…_ Kame was very unsure of what to do; any action could end up in their team being attacked and disqualified. _Maybe we could attack all of them? No, that would make enemies out of everyone else and put us at a huge disadvantage._ A thought occurred to him, suddenly, and he decided to risk it.

"Miriki, I need you to create some form of a distraction for the Stone ninja guarding the tokens when I tell you to, understood?" The Stone genin in question was standing beside the pile of tokens and flinging barrages of earth at the cloud ninja, forcing them to duck behind cover. Miriki nodded assent, and Kame put his plan into action.

He breathed deeply and then cast the Wind Barrier Jutsu- but not on himself. Instead, he centered it on Wasp, which was difficult but not impossible given the way his chakra was connected to it through the thread. A miniature tornado swirled to life around it, but something was wrong- _Crap, the wings!_ He swore mentally as the tornado's intense winds simply tore off the stabilizers. Although Wasp would still be able to move as normal, it would be a lot more difficult to keep it under control.

Without any other real option, Kame just had to press on. He willed through the chakra thread and moved it forward as fast as he could, sending the tiny construct whizzing forward through the fight. Although a lot of the stray kunai and dust were knocked away by the defensive jutsu, Kame still had to dodge quite a few larger attacks. A huge boulder nearly crushed Wasp and his last-second dodge flipped it over, forcing him to concentrate harder and _just barely_ manage to flip it back. Through gritted teeth he grunted, "Now, Miriki!"

Through the corner of his eye, he saw Miriki smiling _way_ too mischievously and even laughing briefly. "Thought you'd never ask." The Sand genin's pupil stretched in three directions and spun briefly into its Hatogan state, his smile growing slightly more strained with concentration. Wasp was nearing the pile, and the Stone guard seemed to notice something, but as he started to turn, suddenly he doubled over and began coughing. Although he was far away and the battle was loud, Kame could catch a few scattered words: "Disgusting", "Tastes like shit", and "Poison".

With the Stone ninja so distracted, Wasp was free to land atop the pile. Kame narrowed his eyes to try and see how many he was grabbing, but it was very difficult. When he closed the four legs inward, it looked to be around six of the tokens, but the Stone ninja suddenly straightened up and stared at the small puppet taking away his prize and roared. _Well, time's up,_ thought Kame. He focused completely on Wasp and willed it to come flying towards him, tearing over at breakneck speed. With the added weight, the quick dodges he'd executed earlier were out of the question, so his only option was to hope that he could make up for it with pure speed.

Luck seemed to be on his side, as Wasp cleared the battle and swung around the boulder that concealed their team. To Kame's chagrin, though, when he released the legs he found not six but five of the little metal things sitting before him. _That doesn't guarantee our win… do we leave now and hope that one team takes way more than the others, or go back for another one?_ It wouldn't be right to just leave the others out of it, so he turned to face them. "Haku, Miriki, I took one too few of these things." He let the shame he felt escape to his face. "So, if we leave now, there's no guarantee that we'll end up in the top five teams. One more of them will guarantee us a spot, so… do you two want to risk it?"

Miriki frowned. "My genjutsu won't work on that guy again, you realize? The way to break it is to do something that contradicts the new sensation. Genjutsu release doesn't work because instead of clouding their chakra points, I _use_ them to lie to their brain about what they're feeling. That guy must have figured out that the literal crap I put in his taste buds wasn't real and swallowed, removing the effect. Now he's wary of it and I can't hit him with another, especially since that genjutsu eats up about one-third of my chakra."

 _Wait, so changing someone's taste alone eats up that much chakra!?_ Kame had started to regain faith in his teammate, but it was dashed by that last statement. Haku chimed in her opinion, "If you two can cover me, I'm pretty sure I can take out the guard and get out of there with a token."

Kame shook his head. "There's too many mixed jutsu flying around out there, actually running into it is a death sentence. I like that plan, but we need to wait for the situation to change, first. I'll tell you guys when I think Haku should engage, okay?" They agreed, and Kame settled in to scan the battle for any opening.

Tetsute's squad was just finishing off the Mist squad. Their surprise attack had been highly effective, and Tetsute's pride-and-joy quicksand jutsu incapacitated them long enough for Rakuyo to knock them out. One of the mist ninja survived the initial combo, but Genji was on him and took his down as well with a Wind Blade Jutsu. Meanwhile, the Cloud and Stone teams that had been previously trading even were now losing members rapidly. Miriki's genjutsu had distracted the stone-thrower long enough for a cloud ninja to get on him with a kunai, smashing the side of his head (with the hilt, thankfully) and putting him out cold. The Stone ninja's comrade responded with an attack using a huge boulder encased over his fist, knocking the Cloud ninja flying.

Suddenly, Zandeina leaped forward from the cover and held out her hands, shouting, "Storm Style: Crackling Doom!" Bright blue lightning leapt from her hands and streamed into three of the Stone shinobi, electrocuting them almost instantly and dropping their bodies to the floor. _Did she… kill them?_ Kame remembered the proctor warning them against excessive violence, but his worries were stopped when one of the Cloud kunoichi's victims stirred and groaned a little bit.

The two remaining Stone shinobi swore and bolted, one of them grabbing their fallen comrade. That meant that, with three members down, one entire Stone team had been taken out. The surviving team was down a member, but probably had the requisite six tokens somewhere with them. Kame briefly toyed with the idea of hunting them down, but Zandeina already seemed to be doing it, charging off after them. Kosu and Dako both took off as well, leaving Tetsute's squad and the crippled Cloud squad as the only two left in the clearing.

Kame decided now was as good as it was going to get, standing and hurling a concussive paper airplane at the center of the clearing. "Haku! Go!"

He detonated the plane, blasting a wave of force out from just above the pile of metal and knocking everything around it back. Haku bolted forward and snatched a token before turning and sprinting back towards them, barely more than a blur as she ate up the distance in seconds. Tetsute shouted angrily and threw a couple of kunai, but she'd already cleared the danger area. Kame slung the backpack with the tokens inside of it over his shoulder, darting off back down the mountain along with Haku and Miriki.

 _Okay, now we just have to make it back to the courtyard with these._ Kame considered the teams that hadn't been present at the battle atop the clearing- the Leaf teams and the Valley team. They were probably waiting with traps, taking the tactic of simply taking other teams' tokens rather than getting them for themselves. A shout from behind them took him out of his contemplation and he turned around in horror to see Tetsute leading Rakuyo and Genju back down the mountain! _Those assholes are gonna chase us down, huh?_

He turned Wasp around and triggered the weapon in its mouth, launching a volley of needles at their pursuers. _That should slow them down, but at some point we'll have to fight them. I'd rather not do it on the mountain, and the terrain should keep us about even on speed, but as soon as we hit solid ground we're too weighed down to outrun them._ "Haku, Miriki," he said, trying to keep his voice down so the other Sand squad wouldn't be able to hear him, "When we hit solid ground we have to turn on them, alright?"

They nodded, and the chase continued on in much the same way for minutes, both teams trading projectile attacks but nothing serious, too focused on keeping their footing on the uneven and rocky mountain surface. Finally, Kame saw the forest floor ahead of him and dropped two paperbombs at his feet before leaping down to it and turning to face his rivals. "Yo, Tetsute, jealous much? Don't you have something better to do than run us down? Or was I right the other night about how insecure you really are?"

Miriki and Haku both glanced at him, as he'd never told them about his less-than-kind parting words with the bullies he'd once called friends. He resolved to explain it to them later, but for the time being he had to focus on the battle. Tetuse stopped on a boulder a good thirty feet up the mountain, sneering at team eight arrayed below him. "Come on, Kame, you've got to do better than that for trash talk. Plus, that was a weak plan; did you honestly think I was gonna miss those paperbombs you dropped?"

Kame shrugged, but Miriki stepped forward and replied for him. "Sorry, we just didn't want to make it too much of a slaughter. If we went all-out on you right from the start, it'd make us look bad."

Tetsute snickered. "All out? Please, Loverboy, it's you and the cripple-" he nodded towards Haku- "That's _I'm_ going easy on. You can't handle me going all-out." Miriki laughed, and Tetsute's eyes narrowed. "What is it? Is something funny?"

"Well, it's just… 'You can't handle me going all-out' was what I said to your mom a couple nights ago." Miriki's smirk grew wider, and Genji broke down laughing. Tetsute shot back a murderous look towards his teammate and turned back to make a comeback, but Miriki wasn't done. "Of course, your sister- she _was_ able to handle me going all-out, so go figure." Tetsute's sister wasn't a shinobi, as far as Kame knew she worked at the family restaurant. "Kinda makes me wonder exactly what kind of service she's giving to your restaurant customers, eh?"

Tetsute's eyes bulged almost out of his skill and the veins in his forehead were visible. He started to yell something, but Miriki just talked over him again. "Anyway, Rakuyo…" He turned to face the team seven kunoichi, shit-eating grin plastered all over his face. "Do you think _you_ could handle me going all-out?" _Oh, no…_ Kame remembered Tetsute's raging crush on the third member of their little group all the way through their time at the academy. "I'm willing to bet no, since Mr. Compensating-For-Something over here seems like all of the dick was put into his personality rather than where it matters."

Genji actually fell over laughing, and Tetsute made a strangled noise and sheathed his kunai, whipping his hands forward and putting them together. _Miriki, you pushed him too far,_ thought Kame, even as he yelled for his teammates to dodge. His warning came not a moment too soon as Tetsute made a series of complex seals and then slammed his hands on the earth. Suddenly, a rippled shot forth and upon reaching a point a few feet ahead of Kame, exploded outwards in a wave of earth.

Even as Kame was leaping back, he saw that the area of Tetsute's jutsu was far too large, perhaps twenty meters in radius. The other boy shouted, "Earth Style: Quicksand Sea!" Kame noticed, too late, that his jump wouldn't take him out of the area, and he'd land within it, which was certain death- once the Quicksand jutsu had you, there was little you could do to escape it. Rakuyo's specialty was marksmanship, and she'd pick him off with ease.

Suddenly, he was grabbed from behind and violently thrown towards the treeline. As he hurtled over to the branches and managed to secure himself just barely, he saw that Haku had intercepted him in mid-air- but now she was in danger. Miriki, on the other hand, had managed to jump up into an overhanging branch and was hiding himself, using the tree as cover. _Damn it, Haku's in trouble now,_ Kame thought, _She can't reposition herself in mid-air, which means she's going to hit the sand!_

There was only one thing he could think of, but it was going to be very difficult. If Haku was pinned, though, there was little doubt that she'd be used as a hostage, and he'd never be able to watch them hurt her without giving in to their demands. _Alright, Deihaka-sensei,_ _if you're watching this, wish me luck!_ Kame jumped _down_ off of the branch, readying one of his Wind jutsu, and waiting for the exact right moment, cast it in his outstretched hand milliseconds before he hit the pool of quicksand. "Gale Force Jutsu!"

The resulting blast of wind knocked him back hard enough that he went flying by the branch he'd just leaped from, a chakra-gripping hand just managing to get him onto it. Since he'd had more downwards speed, his jutsu had also flung Haku away from her impending doom, sending her hurtling off towards the far end of the jutsu. She twisted in the air and managed to grab hold of the branch, using her agility and strength rather than chakra to secure herself.

 _Alright, our turn,_ thought Kame, just as he saw Genji release a jutsu of his own. A sixth sense warned him to duck and saved him from a lot of pain as a blade of wind scythed forward, punching through the leafy branches and crunching a deep crater in the bark of the tree behind where his chest had been. _I guess they're not pulling punches, huh?_

Rakuyo appeared to have chosen Miriki as her opponent, flinging kunai after kunai at him with deadly accuracy. He was pinned behind the trunk of the tree, unable to even poke his head out without a shuriken zipping towards it. _Okay, Kame, think. How can you turn the tables on them?_ Tetsute's jutsu cost him a lot of chakra, but it was a once-off thing. Once the ground was liquefied, it took a couple of hours for it to return to normal, with or without Tetsute's focusing on it. Genji used the Hidden Sand's Wind Blade technique, but he was still a novice, so his attacks were more like Wind Clubs. _Not that they're any less deadly at our level._

Kame spun around the trunk to get some cover before starting to formulate a plan, but all of a sudden Haku was standing right in front of him. "So what's the plan?" He winced a little bit, which she noticed. "Oh, okay then… in that case, I… I learned a finisher move from Shira-sensei, but they have to be in the air for it to work." Kame nodded, taking in the information and thinking about it.

A while ago, Kame had read a book that talked about mid-battle tactics and strategy. It argued that the most important thing to keep in mind during any fight was the win condition: what had to occur in order to win the fight. The more complex or thought-out a shinobi's understanding of their win condition was, the better they could strategize and manipulate the battle until they got there. A non-shinobi, for example, might say that their win condition was to kill the opponents. An academy student might think a little more and say that their win condition was to disable at least one enemy, giving them a numbers advantage that would spiral into eventual victory. A rank genin, upon hearing about Haku's new technique, would correctly state that the win condition was now to knock Tetsute airborne.

However, Kame had already placed a bomb on the ground in front of Tetsute, so Tetsute couldn't go down. Therefore, their win condition for this fight was to get him to move forward, making him jump over the bomb he knew was there. With that in his mind, Kame nodded to Haku and said, "Be ready."

He then ran some chakra through his feet, climbing the tree and hoping that his opponents weren't able to discern his movements. When he emerged to look, his hopes were confirmed; Genji was still watching the middle of the tree when Kame was at the top. _Now, to end this._ He sent Wasp flying around the edge of the fight, keeping it in sight as it kept outside the enemy sightling, until it was some fifty meters above Tetsute's cohort. _Now, you're mine,_ Kame thought, as he gathered some of his remaining chakra and used one of his easier techniques. "Substitution Jutsu!"

Kame appeared, now holding the high ground, and ordered Wasp to fire off a few more needles, which were easily deflected by Tetsute. _Time to finish this,_ he thought, and threw down three paper airplanes at the team seven members. Evidently, they somehow sensed his attack coming, because Rakuyo whirled around and threw a kunai knife at the one flying towards her. She aimed at the next one, but before she could shoot it out of the sky, her eyes widened and she bent at the waist in a familiar display of extreme disgust. _Nice one, Miriki._

Tetsute, who wasn't as good as Rakuyo at marksmanship, instead chose to dodge. He wasn't a complete idiot, and made sure that his backwards jump cleared Kame's paperbomb trap, but his overconfidence cost him dearly as Haku blurred across the battlefield to appear over him. She spun in a forwards somersault, swinging out a leg, and brought her heel down directly onto his midriff with enough force to make Kame cringe.

The strike sent Tetsute flying downwards, but Haku wasn't done, allowing gravity to push her down as well, still spinning in the somersault. Tetsute hit the ground with another loud whump, eyes glazing over slightly, and then her foot came down onto him once more, now with all of her weight and gravity behind it. She yelled, "Sand Devil!" Tetsute, trapped between the second attack and the ground, coughed out _blood_ and went limp. Haku darted back, resuming a defensive Taijutsu pose, but there was no need.

Rakuyo jumped down from her perch and took Tetsute's pulse, then looked angrily at Haku. "What the hell was that, you idiot!? This is a test, not a god damn duel to the death!" Genji also dropped his stance and fell to kneel besides his fallen teammate.

Haku immediately lost the triumph from her face, freezing in her stance of confusion. "I- I'm sorry, I didn't mean to… I didn't…"

Rakuyo glared at her. "Go. Get out of here, you vicious little… ugh."

Haku turned and left, Miriki following her. _This isn't at all what I thought the exams would be like,_ thought Kame. Every source he'd ever heard of listed them as vicious battles where many people died, but as soon as Haku had used a powerful technique all malice had been lost. _Maybe it's just because they're from our same village, but… I don't know._ Kame jogged forward, calling Wasp to join him as he caught up to his two teammates, six tokens still secure in his possession.


	13. Arc 2 Vol 3: Uchiha, Uzumaki, and Hyuga

**Ninja Profile: Genji Sanakishi**

Ninjutsu: B  
Genjutsu: D  
Taijutsu: B  
Specialties: Wind Blade Jutsu, Accuracy, Loyalty

Description: Genji is small and short for his age, with dark brown hair and eyes. He wears an almost perpetual grin as if everything he sees is funny, and is quick to laugh. He usually wears the requisite Sand vest and headband, but underneath he prefers to wear more comfortable sweatpants and loose shirts.

Origin: The Sanakishi are a moderately-sized clan within the Hidden Sand, closely tied to the Kosuki. As a result, Genji grew up with Miriki and spent a lot of time with the other boy. When Miriki decided to become a ninja, Genji followed him into the academy, deciding to learn the Wind Blade technique of the Hidden Sand. However, after they began to meet and interact with the other children, the Sanakishi heir watched as his friend grew more interested in girls than in training, which drove a rift between them. Genji was left with training to dive into, which he did with a passion.

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"C'mon, let's eat, twenty minutes either way isn't going to make a difference…" Miriki wheedled away at Kame. The sun had set, but they were nearing the courtyard even through the darkness. The ambient light from the now-nearby village and the moon was enough for them to travel through the forest, although Kame wasn't sure if it was enough to see an ambush coming. "Come onnnn, please? If there's people, we don't want to fight them on an empty stomach, right? Look, look, this is a great spot here!" he said, as they reached a spot where the dirt of the forest floor dropped straight down into a secluded spot.

 _I'm going to regret this,_ thought Kame, but he still shrugged and dropped down. "Fine, Miriki, we can stop for twenty minutes to eat, but then no more complaining." His squadmate nodded happily and joined him on the ground, Haku sitting with them as well. They all removed various rations from their packs and dug in, and Kame had to admit that Miriki had been at least a little bit right. The stale rations were still great considering he'd been running, stressing, or fighting for several hours straight.

They ate in relative silence, ever-cautious about possible enemies emerging. Kame didn't think that the weakened Cloud, Stone, or Mist teams would attack them, and Tetsute's squad was also unlikely to seek revenge, but that left four teams that were still out there. _Still, it's just a short little walk to the courtyard. We might even finish a whole day before the deadline._

Even after he finished his dinner and was putting the containers away, movement off to the left caught Kame's eye. He leaped up into a ready position and drew a weapon, but loosened slightly when he saw who it was.

A dirty and bedraggled squad of Valley genin walked towards them, with Keikiro throwing up a hand in greeting. "Hey guys, what's… what's up…?" She was obviously trying to look happy, but there was no disguising the pain in her voice or the weak stumble that messed up her walking. Looking at the other two, Gunaji's arm hung limp by his side and Sagino's forehead was bloodied. _Who could have done this to them?_

Miriki was beside Keikiro in an instant, putting her arm over his shoulder and helping carry her over to their camp. "Keikiro… what happened? Why are you guys hurt so bad?"

The smaller genin swallowed. "I… we attacked…" She seemed to be at a complete loss for words, but thankfully Gunaji decided to help her out.

"It was the Leaf team, the younger one." His eyes were hard as he recounted the battle. "We tracked down an escaping Stone team that had a member missing, and took them out. They had six tokens on them, so we grabbed the tokens and booked it towards the courtyard. But, when we got there, they… the team with the Uchiha was waiting, and I think they'd already taken out multiple other teams. The Uchiha girl, I think her name was Naruko, she was gloating about them already having twelve tokens.

"We tried to make it to the courtyard but somehow the Namikaze one used the Wood Release and stopped us, and then Naruko hit us with a genjutsu that trapped us inside our own minds. Sagino got out, but the Hyuga took her down like it was nothing and then came after me and disabled my arm. We tried to escape but they got ahold of my pack, so we lost all of our six of our tokens to them."

Kame nodded, mind racing, and lost in his thoughts as he was he failed to notice Miriki scooting over and grabbing his pack. Before he could ask what the other boy was doing, the pack was open and Miriki had grabbed three of their tokens, holding them out to the Valley genin. "Here, you can have these."

 _What the hell are you doing!?_ Kame briefly considered telling Miriki off but then slowed down and considered the situation. If eighteen of the tokens were already out of the picture, then giving three to the Valley team wouldn't hurt- in fact, as long as both teams made it through the gate, then they should have the same passing guarantee. _Of course, that assumes we can make it through the gate,_ thought Kame darkly.

"If they beat you so handily, then I doubt we can take them on," Kame reasoned. "Therefore, I think we should form a temporary alliance."

Gunaji nodded. "That seems like the best course. But-"

Kame already knew what he was going to say. "We'll take tonight to rest up and attack them tomorrow. I can take first watch, then Haku, then Miriki." Gunaji looked like he was going to object, but Kame shook his head. "No, you all won't take watches. You need to rest and try to recover if you're going to be much help."

Gunaji relented and pulled out his bedroll, and his allies did so as well. Kame climbed up to sit above the others on the dirt ledge, scanning the area as best as he could. However, try as he might to avoid it, his thoughts still drifted to the Leaf team that they'd have to fight. During their first mission, the Valley genin seemed to have similar levels of combat effectiveness as team eight. For them to be beaten so brutally, so easily… how strong was this Leaf team?

They had the Hyuga's Byakugan and Gentle Fist, the Uchiha's Sharingan, and now apparently the Senju Wood Release. In comparison, Kame's complete lack of any Kekkeigenkai, Haku's inability to access hers, and Miriki's mediocre smell and taste alteration seemed so incredibly weak. His thoughts got more and more pessimistic as he kept considering the situation. _We have to approach them from the front, because the courtyard has only one side open to the battleground. They'll see us coming, and then what?_

 _If I try a mass assault of explosives, then… no, it will either fail and our hand will be tipped, or it succeeds and they die. I don't want to kill them. What; then? Gunaji has a good mid-range jutsu, but he's hurt and probably not operating at full capacity. Keikiro is more of a sensory or utility ninja than anything else. If Haku tries anything, she'll just get put under that Uchiha's genjutsu immediately. Miriki is outgunned in the genjutsu department and doesn't have much else going for him, and I…_

 _I guess it all comes down to me, then._ Kame shuddered at the responsibility on his shoulders, the image of that black-haired girl glaring at him growing more and more imposing in his mind. He started running mock battles in his head, thinking through every possible outcome with all the information laid out before him. Every single one seemed to end in him being overpowered, Haku being caught in genjutsu, and Miriki getting immediately taken out.

 _We have to somehow get at least one member through that- wait…_ a chill of cold terror went through him as he realized that the Leaf team probably could have crossed a long time ago. _Why didn't they? Do they enjoy harming the other teams?_ When he thought about the proud Naruko girl looking at him like a disgusting insect, that theory didn't seem all that far off of reality. _Maybe they're overachievers trying to get as high of a score as possible._

He hadn't even noticed how late it was until his timer let out a small noise, alerting him to wake up Haku. _Maybe some sleep will give me the ideas that my waking mind can't_ , he thought, as he shook his teammate awake and laid down to rest.

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The next morning, Haku returned the favor and brought him back to consciousness. When he blinked awake, the first thought in his mind was: _What's that smell? What the- who cooked Miso? In this forest!?_ He sat bolt upright, looking around for the delicious food that he hadn't expected. _Maybe Keikiro or Gunaji or Sagino have secret talents with cooking!?_ His mouth literally watering, he looked around to see the other shinobi all… eating… normal rations…

"Miriki, you son of a-"

Miriki grinned at Keikiro, who was suppressing a giggle. "See, I told you that the smell alteration wasn't useless."

Kame looked at the field rations in his pack and how little he'd be able to enjoy eating them after being tempted with one of his favorite breakfasts. "Miriki, as the democratically elected team leader, I'm going to…" he thought about it for a moment, and with nothing coming to mind, simply collapsed onto his back lamely. "Ugh. Don't do that again."

After choking down the bland calorie bars, he packed back up his bag and took a quick parts check on Wasp. _Maybe I fired too much during that last fight,_ he thought, as Wasp had run through about 70% of its needles. _That means that I can't use that as much during this next one, huh…_

Gunaji, Sagino, and Keikiro all looked miles better. Gunaji's arm looked to have recovered from having its chakra point overloaded, Keikiro's fatigue was all but gone, and Sagino's forehead injury had bled a lot but wasn't all that bad when she was cleaned up. _But that doesn't mean they're at full power_ , Kame reminded himself. _I need to be careful about how much I try to get them to do._

"Alright then, guys, I'm going to be honest with you." He swallowed a little bit, nervous about the concession he was about to make. "I don't have a full plan of attack. From how you guys described them, these guys seem pretty strong, and I don't know if they have any more powers that they didn't use. Therefore, I think we just have to do this on a matchup basis. That way, the teams of two can improvise mid-fight, and I can make sure to try to keep you all away from the people who cover your weaknesses."

The genin around him nodded their agreement. "So, I thought about this a lot, and here's what I have. Naruko, the Uchiha, seems like a genjutsu specialist, so I think me and Gunaji should try to take her on. We both know how to release genjutsu, and she doesn't seem to have any special defense against our physical attacks. Sagino and Miriki, you two should go after the Wood Release user, and Haku and Keikiro, you guys take on the Hyuga. Also, you two should carry the tokens, since you're the fastest."

Miriki coughed a little bit. "You're putting Haku up against their extreme taijutsu specialist? Doesn't the Gentle Fist specialize against other taijutsu users?"

Kame nodded. "Yeah, it seems bad, but keep in mind that the primary effect of the Gentle Fist is that even glancing blows can take away your chance to use jutsu. However, Haku doesn't use jutsu, which mean that having her arms' chakra points blocks should be _less_ bad than it is for us. Plus, she has the best chance of being able to dodge his attacks."

Miriki nodded, quieting down a bit, and then as if an unspoken agreement was reached, all of them stood and started to move towards their objective. As they neared the edge of the forest, Kame tossed back one final bit of advice. "Keep in mind that, in order to pass this test, only one person from each team has to pass into the courtyard."

With that, they broke through the treeline and stood across a grass clearing from the genin squad of the Hidden Leaf. For a moment, all was still, and then they charged.

Kame readied and launched a stream of paper airplanes, but the Uchiha (with sharingan clearly visible in their eyes) seemed to know what was going on with them and took them out of the air with kunai, shaking him a little bit- so far, only Rakuyo had been skilled enough with ranged weapons to do that. Gunaji's stones, though, whipped off towards her, and she couldn't knock those out of the sky. She could, however, dodge them, which she did with seeming ease.

While she was off-balance, Kame launched another airplane at her, detonating it in mid-air to fill the area with a dark smoke. _That should keep her sharingan under control,_ he thought, as he readied Wasp to swing around and attack her from the side. He realized his mistake, though, when Gunaji leaped back and had to recall his attacking stones. "Crap, sorry, dude."

 _So more smoke bombs are out of the question._ Kame hovered Wasp at the edge of the smoke cloud, preparing himself but also taking a moment to look at the other two teams' fights. Haku appeared to be going even with their taijutsu user, while Keikiro was edging around the back and moving towards the goal. Sagino was forcing her way forward through a barrage of wooden attacks, her stone skin unyielding against the wood that splintered against her. Miriki appeared to be looking for an opening to attack through the crashing waves of wood all originating at the Namikaze heir, who… _What?_ The boy had the veined and pale eyes of someone with the Byakugan.

Before he could think about that any further, the smoke had cleared enough and he sent Wasp flying forward towards Naruko. He fired off a few needles at her, but she deflected them with a kunai fairly easily. Gunaji's rocks came back in, but this time she dropped under them and rolled forward, making a few seals in her hands. Suddenly, Gunaji yelped and then froze in place, staring at her. _So her genjutsu is visual, huh? It's most likely centered around her eyes._

Kame made a mental note not to look into her eyes and continued his assault. With her forward dash, Wasp was now behind her, which meant that he could attack with it more seriously. A twitch of his finger launched one of its legs forward, straight towards Naruko's leg. She turned, raising her kunai to deflect it, but misjudged both the size of the projectile and its location, an error that cost her as Wasp's bladed leg sank deep into her leg.

And then she disappeared into a puff of smoke, and a new Naruko shimmered into being directly behind Wasp. A quick swing of her kunai broke the puppet seal, and it fell uselessly to the ground, its chakra cord severed. _Crap, falling for a clone jutsu like some academy student,_ Kame thought. _Of course, the Shadow Clone Jutsu is a jonin level technique that takes a huge amount of chakra- just how skilled is this girl?_

Naruko seemed to be looking at him, although he couldn't know since he wasn't able to meet her eyes. She made a series of seals that started with Tiger- a fire style attack was incoming, then. After running through them, the hands were raised to her face level and she shouted, "Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu!" A searing spray of flame launched forward and Kame had to leap to the side, all but tackling Gunaji out of the way. _What the hell is she thinking, throwing that technique towards an incapacitated opponent!?_

Kame threw another airplane, but instead of dodging or intercepting it she threw a barrage of kunai at him. Incapacitated while blocking them with his own kunai, all he could do was watch helplessly as the plane trailed by, unable to detonate it. _She's really, really good. But- She did just get cocky and leave the bomb there, which could cost her later._ His win condition had changed- now, it was to force her back onto the settled bomb.

Running to the left to avoid another Fireball Jutsu, he rapidly got some napalm paper and folded the plane that made the loop-de-loop in his hands, then tossed two of them forwards, then concentrated his chakra. By the time the planes finished the loop and returned to the space in front of him, he'd charged up enough. "Gale Force Jutsu!" the huge blast of wind pushed him backwards and out of range of her next attack, while also launching the planes forward far quicker than she could defend against. Smirking, he made a separate seal (for Firebombs, it was different than the snake seal that he used for the basic ones) and the two planes exploded, showering Naruko with flame.

 _Wait, crap, I shouldn't have done that_. He remembered himself reproachfully thinking about how she'd done a similar thing mere minutes ago. His worry evaporated almost immediately, though, as a thrown kunai came arcing down towards him. Kame simply sidestepped it, peering closely to see that Naruko had dodged- _She dodged backwards. I knew that it would cost her_ , he thought, and made the snake seal.

Immediately, he felt himself blasted to the side, pain shooting through every nerve in his right leg. _What!?_ He landed a few feet away, panicking at the nerves screaming throughout his whole body now. He'd never been in this much pain, not even when he'd broken a rib, and it was all he could to do to keep from breaking down. However, his mind cleared a little bit as the feeling started to fade, replaced with a cool numbness.

Turning his head, he saw Keikiro standing beside him, concentrating as a green-blue light poured from her hands onto his leg. "K… Kei… Keikiro, what are you… doing…" Kame uttered through gritted teeth, but the Valley kunoichi just ignored him. The light intensified a little bit, and then her eyes fluttered and she keeled over.

 _Does she know medical ninjutsu!? That's incredibly high-level stuff; has she been a prodigy this whole time?_ Kame tried to stand and found that he could now. His right pant leg was a tattered mess, but the flesh visible through the holes appeared raw yet undamaged. She'd definitely healed him somehow, but the details were for another time. Kame felt a wave of shame and anger tear through him- _Naruko must have put my own paperbomb on that kunai and hidden it with a genjutsu. When I detonated it, I was the one who got blasted._

For her part, Naruko looked almost bored, spinning another kunai. For the first time since the fight began, she called out to Kame: "Are you about done? Is that _really_ all you've got?"

Kame narrowed his eyes and started to snarl a retort but realized his mistake when he looked up into her eyes to say it. She smirked even wider and made a quick handsign, and suddenly Kame couldn't move his body at all. _She got me with the genjutsu. Damn; I think we lost this now, there's not way-_

Then Haku came flying in from the side and literally leaped sideways feet-first in a midair kick, pounding Naruko in the midsection with both feet. The Uchiha girl's eyes widened and then Haku's legs extended, sending their target flying off to the side hard enough to crunch her into the wall. It was little wonder that she lost focus on her genjutsu, allowing Kame and Gunaji to move again. Haku straightened up and looked like she was about to say something, but then the Hyuga was on her in milliseconds, slamming a chakra-enhanced hand into her arm.

Haku turned to look at the boy with something approaching disdain in her eyes. _I guess I was right; she does have immunity to the Gentle Fist._ The third Leaf ninja, though, was still a huge threat. He yelled out, "Wood Style: Rootspike!" and large wooden growths began to spit out from the ground and forced the Valley and Sand genin to dodge constantly. Kame hurled an airplane at the boy, but gasped when he looked down- _Crap; I'm running out of paperbombs. I'm down to… two napalm, three wind, and four regular._

The plane flew straight and true, but the Byakugan-wielding Wood user seemed to know exactly what it did, sending a branch out from his defensive wall that impaled the plane, breaking the bomb before he could detonate it. He restrained himself from sending out another one, realizing he'd have to make them all count at this point, and turned to Haku, saying, "Thank for the save!"

She nodded and then turned her attention to the Hyuga, but then jerked forward as a kunai hit her in the shoulder. Whirling around, her eyes widened and then she stopped moving entirely. _There's no way…_ but Kame saw his fears confirmed at the sight of Naruko, shaky but still on her feet and Sharingan still active. _She's still conscious after that kick!?"_

Naruko made another series of seals and then spat out, "Fire Style: Running Flame!" A huge fire blazed to life before her and came curving over towards Haku, who was still out from the genjutsu. Kame's eyes widened in horror and he started to run towards her. _She's already trapped in the genjutsu; why is Naruko attacking her?_ He could only watch as the fire blasted into Haku, launching her back into the wooden wall of the Namikaze. The fire curved again, now coming straight at him, and he was forced to roll to the right, still feeling it singe his leg.

The fire still came at him, faster and faster, but he managed to dodge it each time. However, he couldn't manage any offense around the constant assault, and even worse, the fire was getting faster. _I can't keep this up; what do I do?_ The question was answered, though, when Naruko swore loudly and the fire spluttered out. _What the hell happened…?_

Looking up, Kame saw the answer to his question. Keikiro and Haku, both unconscious, were laying _inside_ the courtyard. _We passed. We passed!_ Kame felt a huge grin split his face and he fist-pumped in victory. _I guess that Sagino, Miriki and I did such a good job distracting the Leaf ninja that… Wait, how did the two unconscious people get into the courtyard?_ Suddenly, two little black forms came flying out from under the kunoichi and into Gunaji's waiting hand. _He must have used the stones to move them._

Naruko swore again and glared at the two girls, kunai in hand. She hopped the fence and walked towards them, shaking slightly, and Kame started forward- _She's unstable; she might actually…_ However, the Hyuga dashed over to her and said said something that actually seemed to make her _more_ angry. Instead of attacking the two unconscious ninja, though, she stomped over to a corner of the courtyard and stood there glowering, quickly joined by her two teammates.

 _Oh, she must have been the one carrying the tokens; so when she hopped the fence she finished the exam for her team…_ Kame was perturbed by how intense her rage at only getting _eighteen_ points was. She won this stage by way more than she had to; why was she looking at Haku and Keikiro like they'd just killed her family in front of her?

 _Wait- Haku and Keikiro!_ Kame dashed over to stand beside his downed teammate, feeling a sharp spike of fear at the sight of her unconscious. She'd been struck from the front by Naruko's flame jutsu, and it showed- there were serious burns on her stomach and thighs. "Medical ninja? Anyone!?" Kame felt the panic show in his voice, but there was with his teammate lying injured on the ground in front of him he honestly couldn't care less.

The door to the courtyard was knocked open and a few medical ninja stepped out, carrying a stretcher. Kame could only watch as they loaded Haku onto it and walked back out, hoping that they could help her when he couldn't. _I failed… for all of my planning, my paperbombs, my… everything, I'm too weak._ He let himself drop to his knees, putting his head in his hands. _We had more numbers, we had surprise, and… we still lost. I got injured, Haku got injured. How the hell are we ever going to beat these people?_

Miriki nudged him with a foot, smiling way too much for the situation at hand. _I'm not in the mood for your stupid jokes, Miriki, so take-_ "We'll be okay, Kame." Kame looked up to see his Hatogan still active. _He can see my fears…_ "We passed this test, and we'll pass the next one. Haku's not going to die, and that Naruko girl isn't a demigod… although, to resist my charms, she's damn well close to one..."

Kame gritted his teeth, but his jaw dropped when he saw Miriki walk over towards the Leaf team. He was forced to jump to his feet and dash to try and stop the boy, but was once again too slow to do anything but listen. "So, Naruko, that's a pretty nice genjutsu you got there, huh?"

Her eyes flared and she spat back, "Nice enough to take out two of you and get eighteen tokens, loser."

Miriki raised his eyebrows and held up his hands in a placating gesture. "Hey, hey, we're all friends here, right? No need to flip out on me, babe."

She started angrily towards him but was stopped by the Hyuga boy holding her arm. He looked at her and said, "Please, Naruko, calm down. We won the round, by six times their score. That's enough, right?"

Miriki looked at the boy, then at the girl, and then back again, a grin spreading across his face. "Ohhh, I see… That's your secret." When the two of them looked confusedly at him, he actually laughed. "Not many women can resist my advances, but I see that you already had a lover… my bad, my bad, I should have been trying a lot harder."

The Hyuga boy flushed bright red and started to say something to Miriki, but Naruko beat him to the punch. "Shut the f… I swear to god, if you don't shut your damn mouth, I'll… You're an untalented waste of oxygen from a no-name clan in the middle of the desert, so get that cocky smirk off of your face and show some respect."

Miriki, if anything, smiled _wider_. "Hey, that's some indecent language from an important heir to Leaf village royalty, no? I think you need your mouth washed out." Something happened, and then Naruko gagged, spitting on the ground in front of herself and cursing wildly.

"What the… You…." She seemed to figure it out and straightened back up, eyes wild. _Miriki, if you push her any further, she'll…_ Kame realized what his teammate was doing. _This is his own way of taking revenge for Haku. He's always been more of a talker than a fighter, I guess it figures that he'd find a way to make people that upset with just his words._

Miriki rolled his eyes and started to turn and walk away. "The whole forest and even this courtyard are plastered with video cameras. Wouldn't want all the gathered jonin to see you lose your shit after being taunted… oh, wait, it's too late for that one. Good luck making chunin when a rank genin can make you froth at the mouth." As he stepped away, Naruko's hand twitched and she seemed to be teetering on the bare edge of doing something violent, but with her teammates restraining her and all of the jonin watching, she reluctantly turned back to her own squad.

Kame let the tiniest of smiles creep onto his face. "Miriki, I have to say, you're _really_ good at that."

He shrugged. "There's a reason my clan is still in the Hidden Sand without producing ninja. The Hatogan is better in a business meeting or diplomatic mission than in a battle."

"What do you mean?" Kame didn't see how altering senses would be useful in a casual, conversational setting.

"Well, I just used it on Naruko…" He wasn't getting it.

"No; but why would making them taste soap be useful on a diplomatic mission?"

Miriki seemed to finally figure out the argument and rolled his eyes. "No, not that, idiot. I mean that I looked into her mind; she's deadly afraid of failing the chunin exams. Or, at least, she was… Now she's just angry at me, and you, and Haku. I don't need Hatogan to see that."

Kame shook his head. _She demolished this test and passed with eighteen tokens; why the hell would she be afraid of failing the exams!?_ His thinking was cut short by the arrival of another squad in the training yard. Turning around, he saw Kosu, Zandeina, and Dako all stepping through the fence gate. _Okay, so that's four teams now._ Zandeina dropped a pile of five tokens, which meant… _There's one token left. Whoever got that one will be the last team to pass._

Kame wondered who it would be, but groaned internally as he looked up and saw Tetsute walking towards the courtyard, followed by Rakuyo and Genji. _Why the hell… Why did it have to be them?_ Tetsute stepped through the gate, head downcast, probably beating himself up over his single token. The second Rakuyo and Genji made it through behind him, the gate snapped shut and Metal Lee appeared in the middle of the courtyard.

"Greeting, genin teams! The teams that pass have now been decided, so congratulations to everyone here! The top team, with eighteen tokens, is team one from the Hidden Leaf, composed of Naruko Uchiha, Kakuzen Uzumaki, and Sureki Hyuga!" Naruko didn't move at all during the announcement, but Sureki smiled and Kakuzen simply nodded.

"In second place with five tokens, team four from the Cloud, composed of Dako Nakimoka, Zandeina Ryukana, and Kosu Iburi!" Zandeina shot a glare at the Leaf team, Dako grunted and nodded, and Kosu fist-pumped wildly. _Ryukana… where have I heard that surname before…_ thought Kame. "In third place with three tokens, team eight from the Sand, composed of Kame Hakiara, Haku…" Metal paused, glancing at the paper, before clearing his throat and continuing. "And Miriki Kosuki!" Kame grinned and saw Miriki do the same.

"In fourth place also with three tokens (but a lower written test score), team five from the Hidden Valley: Gunaji Kokuseki, Sagino Kokuseki, and Keikiro Torrakku." Keikiro seemed to have recovered enough to sit up and wave weakly, her teammates surrounding her. "And finally, in fourth place with one token; team seven from the Sand: Tetsute Hasagi, Rakuyo Kuyanari, and Genji Sanakishi." None of them celebrated at all, Tetsute's hand visibly tightening on the single token he held. _He's not going to take this well,_ thought Kame. _Not only to barely get through, but to do worse than the people he looked down on and bullied…_

Metal put his hands on his hips and smiled widely. "Again, congratulations to all of you for getting this far! We will have a full day of down-time; after which you must all report to the Arena for one-on-one duels. Your opponents will be revealed to you once you have arrived, so prepare for all possible outcomes. Exit through this door when you're ready;" he pointed to a lower door that presumably led back into the village, "your sensei are waiting for you."

As Kame stepped forward towards the exit, he tried to bask in the glory that he'd felt when passing the first stage of the exam, but his mind was too focused on Haku to be happy.


	14. Arc 2 Vol 4: Living Legends

**(A/N) Double-upload today, maybe even triple. Tell me if you think I'm mischaracterizing people; especially Boruto characters but Naruto ones as well. Honestly any advice would be greatly appreciated.**

 **Ninja Profile: Sureki Hyuga**

Ninjutsu: B  
Genjutsu: C  
Taijutsu: A  
Specialties: Jyuuken, Byakugan, Taijutsu

Description: Sureki Hyuga stand at a normal height, but is thin and frail despite much training. He bears a striking resemblance to his deceased relative Neji, especially when he dresses in the more traditional Hyuga whites and grays. He is usually quite cheerful and open in conversation, but quickly becomes reserved and awkward when negative emotions and topics come up.

Origin: Sureki Hyuga was born the child of Hanabi Hyuga and the heir to the Hyuga clan, but his Byakugan was weaker than it should have been. While still present, it lacked the acuity and range of stronger manifestations. Ashamed of his weak bloodline trait, he decided to make up for it by becoming the greatest master of Jyuuken ever born into the clan. From a young age through his academy graduation, he trained with anyone who would teach him until his precision and grace were unparalleled. Upon meeting his squadmates, Naruko Uchiha and Kakuzen Uzumaki, he quickly got along with them and soon their team performed well enough for their jonin to sponsor them into the chunin exams.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Deihaka was beaming at them when they made it into the lobby. _The only place that I've seen that overkill level of pride is in new parents._ He'd been talking to Senshiko, but as soon as they exited he darted over to them and held up his hands for high-fives. _Wait, seriously?_ Kame complied, a bit put off by how childish his squad leader was acting.

Miriki, on the other hand, ran up and gave a full high-five to Deihaka, grinning like an idiot. "Yeah! We did it, sensei!"

"You bet you did it! It's all thanks to my incredibly amazing teaching skills. If I hadn't made all those great Executive Teacher Decisions, you all wouldn't be standing here!" _Deihaka-sensei, what are you saying? Aren't teachers supposed to give the credit to their students?_ Kame shook his head in exasperation.

Miriki cocked his head. "You can't take _all_ the credit, Deihaka-sensei." _You're right, Miriki, we also-_ "If it weren't for my incredible leadership skills and genius-level intellect, then I don't think we could have passed either exam."

Deihaka nodded sagely. "Well done, Miriki." He turned to Kame, who was restraining himself from letting loose on the two of them in public. _I think they're actually getting worse- or maybe Miriki is just infecting Deihaka-sensei bit by bit._ "Kame, I'm proud of you and Haku as well. Oh, speaking of Haku, you guys are probably worried about her; she was taken to the hospital, but she should be alright."

Kame, remembering something they'd been told at the very start of the exam, whirled around to confront Metal Lee, who had followed them out of the courtyard. "Metal Lee- er, Proctor. Will Naruko Uchiha be disqualified?"

Metal Lee appeared to freeze up, glancing briefly at the Leaf squad and then back at Kame. "Umm… I do not plan to disqualify her, because-"

Kame wouldn't listen to his excuses. "You don't plan to disqualify her? Why? Didn't you announce at the start of the exam that attempts to kill or injure other participants would be met with severe repercussions? Where are the repercussions for her attack on my immobile comrade?"

Metal was clearly nervous, glancing again at Naruko and then choking out a response. "I… do not see… any reason to disqualify… her-"

"Could it be because she's the pride and joy of your village? Or maybe this is just personal favoritism?" Kame challenged. Metal swallowed, but before Kame could press the point any further, Deihaka took him by the shoulder.

"Come on, Kame." He turned around, starting towards the door. "Let's go check on Haku in the hospital, okay?"

Kame nodded, although his heart still seethed with resentment for the bureaucratic and clearly political favoritism shown to his Leaf rival. They exited the building and then took a sharp right, going down a few blocks and drawing glances from the people on the streets. _I guess they're not used to ninja wearing sand uniform, huh?_ In sharp contrast to the green and pocketed utility vests of the Hidden Leaf, Sand shinobi wore dark brown combat vests that were build more for protection than storage.

When they entered the hospital, an attendant seemed to recognize them and directed them down a short hallway on the ground floor. They passed by rooms cordoned off with cloth barriers, but Kame still got glimpses of a few of the Mist, Cloud, and Stone shinobi, none of whom looked all that harmed. However, at the end of the hallway, there was a far more serious-looking room behind a set of double-doors. The hospital worker stopped them outside and then entered. Minutes passed, and Kame grew more and more terrified. _Those burns were pretty bad… and they happened during a genjutsu._ Although he knew from his studies that such an interaction wasn't anything special, his mind still ran rampant with theories.

It grew worse as the minutes stretched into hours, and he grew more and more terrified that something had gone wrong. _Even simple surgeries can go horrifically wrong if the doctor makes an error… Haku was hurt on her stomach; what if they accidentally broke her internal organs!?_ It took an extreme conscious effort to sit still and wait, but wait he did. For once, Miriki didn't read his thoughts, and Deihaka didn't make any attempts to alleviate the stress. All three of them sat there, silent, for hours on end.

Eventually, the door opened back up, and standing in it was a woman that made Kame's heart briefly stop. Pink-haired, wearing a red robe and with a green diamond on her forehead, he knew about this kunoichi because he'd read her name at least a thousand time. He barely managed to squeak out, "Sakura…"

She gave him an odd look before turning to face Deihaka. "Alright, your charge is going to be just fine. She'll be up and about in a couple of minutes and should even be fine to compete in the tournament." _That's a relief…_ "I heard what happened and I'd like to apologize for what my granddaughter did to your friend."

Kame looked up sharply. _Granddaughter? Does that mean that Sarada Uchiha is Naruko's mother?_ Still, a burning question was in his mind, and before he could stop himself it turned to words. "Why? Why you? Why would they call you to treat Haku?"

"What!? I'm an incredibly accomplished medical ninja, you disrespectful whelp!" Sakura rolled up a sleeve and turning murderous.

Kame rapidly backed off, raising his hands in apology. "No, no, I'm sorry, I didn't mean it that way. I know you're an incredibly talented medical ninja, probably the most talented one ever besides your master Tsunade. But…" Sakura's face had softened a bit at the praise. "Why you? Haku's burns weren't life-threatening."

Sakura actually reddened a little bit and looked away. "I was called in to make sure that she could fight in the tournament."

 _But why would-_ Kame realized in horror why Sakura had suddenly started looking nervous. _Naruko, her granddaughter and one of the few remaining Uchiha, can't afford to have taken an opponent out of the tournament- then they can't pretend they aren't bending the rules. If Haku can't fight, then Naruko injured an opponent and should be disqualified._ He narrowed his eyes but didn't dare speak his mind before the legendary teammate of Naruto and Sasuke.

She seemed to grasp his understanding of the situation and sighed. "Naruko… she has a lot of pressure on her, and I think that you shouldn't push her so far that she'd-"

 _That's it._ Kame interrupted the older ninja, unable to bite his tongue any longer. "She's unstable! Haku landed one hit on her, and in response Naruko trapped her in a genjutsu; but instead of leaving the defeated opponent be, she _attacked my incapacitated teammate_. If you don't muzzle her soon, she's going to end up killing someone!"

Sakura breathed heavily and looked at him with barely hidden contempt. "You don't have the faintest clue about her situation, so stop passing judgement without knowing the full picture." With those words, she brushed past Kame and walked off down the hallway.

Kame turned to watch her leave, but a voice from behind him brought him eyes back around to the hospital room. "Hey, guys… I'm glad to see you…" Haku's voice was weak, weaker than he'd ever heard it. When he saw her, she had bandages wrapped all around her upper legs and midriff. She smiled at them, but even that was shaky and obviously forced. _Haku, I… I shouldn't have let this happen._

Kame, Miriki, and Deihaka all rushed over to her bedside, with Deihaka asking the first question. "How do you feel? Did they heal all the burns?"

She nodded. "I think so… none of it hurts, anymore. I think I can…" She swung her leg over off of the bed and gasped in pain. "Agh! Okay, that's not happening."

Kame knitted his eyebrows in worry, hesitant to even touch the leg. "What's wrong? Is the burn still there?"

She shook her head. "Nah, but… the leg feels super sore. I guess that's from having the muscles rebuilt through healing jutsu, huh?" She moved across the other leg and, gritting her teeth, lifted herself off of the bed and onto her feet. "Nghh- Okay, I think I can move around, I'm just gonna have to walk it off."

Deihaka nodded, and then she turned around to rummage in her pack, removing another skirt and turning briefly to jerk her head towards the door of the room. Kame flushed bright red and hastily escaped, followed by the others, and after thirty seconds Haku followed. The medical bandages had been replaced with her normal athletic ones and over them she wore another purple skirt coming down to just above her knees.

She winced with each step at first, but as she made forwards progress the winces grew weaker and weaker until she stopped altogether. They stepped out into the street and Kame only just realized how late it was- they'd woken up very late during the exam, maybe around lunchtime (due to all of them having exerted themselves so hard during the first day). Still, it was hard to believe that six whole hours had gone by planning, fighting, waiting, and then sitting in the hospital.

Deihaka scratched his head and pointed off to their left. "All the jonin squad leaders watched the camera feeds together, and I met the Leaf one. He recommended a dinner joint, so if you guys want to go there…?"

Haku nodded eagerly. "Yes, please!"

Miriki, though, awkwardly put a hand behind his head and cleared his throat. "Actually, Deihaka-sensei, I have a dinner date with Keikiro that I need to be going on, so…"

Deihaka's eyes lit up strangely. "Oh… yes. Yes! We can ask the Valley genin to come with us and do a team dinner!" Miriki opened his mouth to protest, but it was too late. "Executive Teacher Decision; we're doing a team date." _Oh…_ Kame realized why his sensei was acting so strangely. _He just wants an excuse to go to dinner with Senshiko, doesn't he…_

They found the Valley genin near the inn that most of the exam participants were staying in, waving them over and pitching the idea. Keikiro had the same reaction as Miriki, but the lovebirds were overruled by an oddly-pleased-looking Senshiko. The two teams made their way across the town and eventually ended up walking into a place called Ichiraku Ramen.

It was a small place, with two tables and ten barstools. Deihaka sat down on the far left, graciously offering Senshiko the seat beside him. Keikiro and Miriki sat next, then Sagino claimed the other spot beside Miriki and Gunaji the spot beside Sagino. Kame sat next to Gunaji and Haku slid in beside him, leaving two empty seats to the right. Once they all got settled, an aging woman came out through a screen and smiled at them. "Welcome to Ichiraku Ramen, I'm Ayame, what can I get you?"

Kame took a look at the menu, seeing something called a 'Naruto Special'. _Well, obviously I'm getting that_ , he thought, holding up the menu and pointing at it. "Can I get one of these?" Ayame nodded. Haku ordered _three_ more of them, and Gunaji ordered only one. While the others ordered their food, Gunaji turned towards Kame and proffered a hand.

"Congrats on getting through stage one, man."

Kame smiled and returned the favor, giving him a handshake. "You too. Thanks for helping us out against the Leaf team."

Gunaji nodded. "No problem… I'm just more afraid of how we're gonna take them on in the finals…" _Yeah, no kidding,_ thought Kame. _Haku killed a guy with one of her punches, but a direct hit against Naruko didn't even knock her out._ "Anyway, I was surprised we even made it through the written exam. Keikiro and Sagino both got seventeens, and I got a twenty, so we literally hit the bare minimum to pass."

Kame nodded. "We probably weren't going to make it, but Miriki's visual kekkegenkai got him a pretty decent score and I used my one cheat-for-free to give Haku my answers."

Gunaji eyes widened. "Ohh… and they couldn't punish you because of the… that's pretty smart!" Kame tried not to look too pleased.

"Well, I think the real praise is for you, dude. If you hadn't lifted Haku and Keikiro into the courtyard, we might not have made it through that last one." Now it was Gunaji's turn to flush a little bit and turn away at the returned compliment. "Honestly, do you want to meet up tomorrow and talk strategy? At this point, those Leaf guys are the biggest threat, so I think it's in both of our interests to share information on them."

The Valley genin appeared to consider that briefly, and then nodded. "Okay, let's go to one of the training fields- wait, we're staying in the same inn, right? Let's just meet up at nine o'clock?"

Kame winced. "What about seven?" A two-hour gap in the morning sounded pretty painful to schedule around, and he didn't want to wake up late and waste all that time. Gunaji nodded, and then their food arrived.

When Kame turned his attention to the ramen before him, his heart fluttered a little bit- this was the best-smelling ramen he'd ever… well, smelled. The gathered ninja all muttered a quick "Itadakimasu", clearly distracted by the amazing food. When he spooned up a bite and ate it, he wasn't disappointed. _You can suck it, Tetsute,_ he thought. _This is ten thousand times better than your family's cheap-ass stuff_.

He savored each bite, and was too busy eating to continue conversation. Beside him, Gunaji appeared to be doing the same thing. A glance to his left told another story, thought, as Haku was through a bowl and a half without showing signs of slowing. Kame actually froze as he watched his kunoichi teammate tear through the second bowl and start in on the third, which soon followed the other two and emptied. Even more ridiculously, she raised a hand and asked for _another bowl_.

He turned to look at Deihaka. _The other night, he acted like money was an issue… what's he gonna- wait, what the…_ His sensei was slightly flushed, and an empty bottle of sake on the table before him told the rest of the story. _Deihaka-sensei is drunk._ Turning to look at Senshiko, Kame saw that the kunoichi jonin had drained three bottles and was also a little bit red in the face. _I don't like where this is going._

Miriki and Keikiro were giggling and in their own little world, while Sagino held a conversation with her twin brother Gunaji, sparing an occasional longing glance at Miriki. In that moment, Kame felt strangely ecstatic, happy to be sitting in a ramen shop surrounded by friends and people so full of life.

The moment broke when he heard footsteps from behind him. Somehow, he knew what he'd find, but turned anyway and saw his worst fears confirmed- Naruko Uchiha was standing there, arms crossed and looking at them with derision and hatred. Kame was just about to return the glare and maybe even insult her when the curtains behind the three genin opened once more and he saw two adults standing there. All traces of any disrespectful plans gone, his heart skipped a beat when he saw who they were:

Naruto Uzumaki and Sasuke Uchiha stood in the doorway, the former dressed in orange and smiling happily while the latter wore black and had a much more restrained expression. _I… they… it's really them…_ Kame felt his mouth flop open but couldn't close it; two of his idols were standing right in front of him, _looking at him_ , and all he could do was stare at them with widened eyes. _Come on, Kame, say something!_ He squeaked out, "Welcome to Ichiraku Ramen!" _No, not that, you god damn idiot._

Naruko's glare shifted to more disgusted than hateful, while Sasuke raised an eyebrow at him, arms crossed. Naruto, on the other hand, grinned even wider and stepped forward to offer a handshake, saying, "Sand and Valley shinobi inviting me into my own hometown's ramen shop? Well, consider me welcomed!"

Kame stared at the man's hand, still not quite registering what was going on. "I… I can't…" He shook his head, still looking at the hand.

"Why not?" Naruto's smile weakened slightly.

"Be- Because I- I'm not worthy!" Kame bowed his head and stared at the ground. _Can I embarass myself any more in front of Naruto and Sasuke?_ "You're the hero of the ninja world, the tailed-beast-tamer and jinchuriki of the strongest biju, the ninetails! You defeated Madara Uchiha, Kaguya Otsusuki, and all of the Akatsuki; and you are the hero of _my_ hero, Gaara… I don't deserve to shake your hand!"

Naruto chuckled a little bit and then broke out into a full laugh, turning to face Sasuke. "Sasuke, you hearing this?"

"Yeah, I'm hearing all of those empty words," Sasuke drawled. "They're clearly misinformed if _you're_ the hero of the ninja world. I was right there fighting Kaguya with you, wasn't I?"

Kame interjected. "But you're no less impressive, Sasuke! Your clan is legendary, and you are possibly the strongest member ever. You defeated Orochimaru of the sannin in single combat, fought Naruto to a stalemate, and helped in the defeat of all of those enemies I credited to Naruto…"

Sasuke finally cracked a smile, but Naruko's expression somehow soured even further. She sighed, "Grandfathers, can we get out of here?"

"Why?" Naruto hungrily glanced at the ramen they were eating.

"Because these losers are taking up the whole bar, so we might as well just go somewhere else. Besides, this kid can praise you all he wants, but he'd just a suck-up spewing empty words. He lost _hard_ to me during the exam second stage."

Naruto's smile didn't waver. "But they're _nice_ empty words, dearest. Besides, this is the reason they added the tables." He slid into one of the tables, motioning for Naruko to do the same. "This is your victory dinner, don't ruin it just because others also enjoy the ramen at Ichiraku."

Naruko poorly concealed a pout but sat anyway, and Ayame shuffled over to take their order. Kame tried to turn back and eat his food, but his eyes kept drifting off to focus on the living legends only a few short feet away from him. After minutes, he finally resumed his eating, forcing himself to consume the food, but choked on it and spat a whole mouthful back into the bowl when Naruto's voice came at him: "Hey, kid, you said that you knew Gaara? How is he; it's been a while!"

Kame spun around in time to see Sasuke roll his eyes and say, "You idiot, Gaara's coming anyway soon. The Kage gather to watch these tournaments, which you should know _because you are one!_ "

Naruto shrugged. "Yeah, I know, but I kinda want to know what I'm walking into."

Kame found his voice. "Uhmm…Lord Gaara has been fine when I've met him…" Afraid of disappointing the Hokage, he searched his mind for more to say. "He's actually been a little bit stressed out lately, because Ha-" _Shit! I almost told him way too much!_ Kame remembered Gaara's explanation about the power balance between the villages, and he clammed up almost immediately.

Naruto raised an eyebrow but the brief exchange ended when Ayame gave him his food, so Kame took the chance to whirl back around and finish off his ramen. Haku gave him an incredibly hard to read look, but then finished her own bowl of ramen (her sixth one). Deihaka, now swaying and a little bit unsteady, was polishing off a fourth bottle of sake, while Senshiko's spot on the counter was littered with at least ten empty bottles. Deihaka was staring at the woman's chest, and she didn't seem to mind, putting an arm over his shoulder and pulling him in tight.

Kame blushed and looked away, noticing that Miriki and Keikiro had both finished and were now holding hands. _Ugh._ Gunaji was staring at Sasuke intently, looking as amazed as Kame felt. After a few minutes of relative silence, Ayame walked up to their little group and laid a tab down on the counter. _That's…_ Kame jolted back a little bit. _Holy crap, that's 40,000 yen!? How the hell did we eat that much?_

Deihaka, now leaning on Senshiko and hiccuping, seemed to interpret the check as a signal to leave, and dragged Senshiko out the door. Gunaji, Keikiro, and Sagino followed their sensei, and Miriki tagged along with Keikiro. _Wait a minute…_ Kame looked up, heart sinking, to see Ayame looking at _him_ expectantly. _Oh, crap…_ for the briefest of moments, he considered trying to fob the check off onto Haku, but the thought was gone almost as soon as it entered his mind and he reluctantly pulled the necessary money from his wallet. _Well, there goes my pay for the last five missions…_

As he rose to exit, Naruko tossed a final double-edged comment at his back. "See you in a few days for a repeat, loser." Kame slowed down a little bit, but he wasn't about to fight her in the middle of the restaurant, so instead he just kept walking. He took a tiny bit of satisfaction in the immediate scolding from Naruto and Sasuke that followed her jab.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Kame woke up the next morning a lot more refreshed than he thought he'd be, considering that he'd slept on the floor of their room. Upon arriving at the inn, Deihaka and Senshiko had claimed the room originally reserved for the Valley squad for themselves, leaving the six genin to find a way to split the three-bed room reserved for the Hidden Sand. This had almost immediately ended in the three kunoichi getting the beds, but Miriki had weaseled into sleeping beside Keikiro and Sagino had agreed to let her brother Gunaji in next to her.

Kame, on the other hand, hadn't had the nerve to ask Haku to share her bed, so he'd ended up alone on the floor. _Although, it was surprisingly nice,_ he thought. When he sat up, he noticed that it was 6:30. _Enough time for breakfast before me and Gunaji go practice._ Looking around, he saw that Sagino and Keikiro were sitting on their beds talking, while Haku was still sleeping, seemingly wearing only her bandages as pajamas. However, as soon as he stood up, Sagino darted over beside him. "Okay, you _finally_ woke up. Now get out. Out!" She pushed him out of the room's door and into the hallway, where he stood in his Shukaku pajamas. _Huh, maybe these things are unlucky…_

After a few minutes, the door opened back up to reveal the three kunoichi clad in their day clothes, Haku still blinking sleepily. "Alright, your turn," Sagino said, marching off towards the lobby. Kame hurriedly re-entered the room, got dressed, and grabbed a breakfast bar from his pack, then walked down into the lobby. Standing there already were Deihaka and Senshiko, standing abnormally close to one another and both seemingly nursing extreme hangovers.

Miriki and Keikiro were just walking out the door, and Kame didn't want to intrude on whatever was happening between his sensei and the Valley jonin, so he opted to walk over to Gunaji. He, Haku, and Sagino were having a conversation that Kame caught the tail end of. Sagino was gesturing towards Haku and saying, "Come on, bro, back me up here. She needs a new coat."

Kame looked over at the offending piece of clothing. It was a bit too small for her, and patched in places. _She was wearing it five years ago in the Kazekage's vision…_ _It was too big for her then._ _Still, it probably has a hell of a lot of sentimental value to her if she's had it for that long…_ Haku looked self-consciously down at her coat and spoke awkwardly. "I… I like this coat, I kinda just want-"

Sagino just talked over the smaller girl. "Look, how about we go to a clothing store, and if you still want to keep it, then you totally can!" Haku seemed okay with that prospect, and so Sagino dragged her off, leaving Gunaji and Kame standing next to one another.

"So… do you want to head off to a training field…?" Kame offered.

"What? Oh, yeah, sure… I'm sorry that my sister hauled off your teammate just because she wants an excuse to go clothes-shopping." Kame smiled, thinking, _so that's why…_

He and Gunaji stepped out onto the street and, through intuition and asking directions, made their way to the practice fields. On the way there they drew stares just like they had the day before. _This must be a very tight-knit community if outsiders draw this much attention,_ Kame considered. _Either that, or they're incredibly suspicious of ninja not in Hidden Leaf uniform; which is perfectly reasonable._

They chose one of the unoccupied practice fields and stood next to one another, Gunaji pulling out a few shuriken and taking practice throws at one of the targets. He was surprisingly good at it for someone whose ninjutsu technique basically invalidated the need for projectile weaponry. Kame pulled out a large sheet of extra paper and an inkwell, preparing himself to make a new batch of paperbombs. _If I run out tomorrow, then there's going to be a huge problem._

Once they'd settled, Gunaji broke the silence. "I've spent a lot of time studying kekkeigenkai, and I know enough about the Sharingan to see that she's not your average user."

"No?" This was news to Kame.

"Yeah, she's… well, there's two possibilities. The first is that she's unlocked the Mangekyo sharingan; which is ridiculous at her age and also would blind her unless she took the eyes from another living Uchiha. Given the lack of other living Uchihas, I think it's safe to rule that one out." Kame nodded. "Therefore, the second possibility is that she's just an incredibly powerful user of the basic sharingan. The normal sharingan has a visual component and a hypnotic component, and I think that she's using an enhanced version of the hypnotic component in order to freeze us."

Kame nodded. "Okay…?"

"Therefore, I think I know how to… well, not beat her, but I know a weakness. The sharingan, apparently, drains a huge amount of chakra, and she has to have it out to sustain the paralyzing effect. Also, if she closes her eyes, you're unparalyzed briefly, so if you can look away in the split second she spends blinking, you can get out." _Those are some incredibly difficult to exploit weaknesses,_ Kame thought.

 _I guess I should spill what I know, huh?_ He turned towards Gunaji, hands still robotically grabbing, writing on, and then infusing chakra into the paperbombs. "My teammate, Miriki, has a visual kekkegenkai called- wait, what am I saying, he explained it to you already. Anyway, he says that Naruko is incredibly insecure about her skills and is terrified of losing, which explains a lot of her behavior.

"She's also demonstrated herself to be extremely mentally unstable, so I think another way of getting to her could be through taunting or embarrassing her in any way. In front of the gathered ninja, in such a public setting, it's practically guaranteed to make her lose her cool."

Gunaji nodded, suddenly looking thoughtful. "She also uses fire style, so if you have water release…"

Kame shook his head. "Nope, wind and fire."

Gunaji grimaced. "I got earth, and that's it."

Kame sighed. "What about her teammates? The Namikaze guy, Kakuzen, he has wood release…" _That shouldn't be possible,_ Kame thought. _I thought only Hashirama Senju had access to that kekkeigenkai._ "Anyway, he's pretty good with it for defense and offense."

Gunaji shrugged. "But you have fire release, so…"

Kame frowned. "But you don't…" He thought for a moment, and then sighed and reached into his pack. "Here, I have something for you." He grabbed all three of yesterday's Firebombs, handing them to Gunaji. "I made these; they have fire chakra instead of normal chakra in them. If you end up against him, use them."

Gunaji reached for them, but snapped his arm back. "No, I can't… It's your strength, if I were to win because of it…"

"Just take it." Kame pushed towards Gunaji. "You helped us with information before, so just access my help now."

The other boy accepted them, seemingly grudgingly. "Thanks."

Kame nodded, turning his attention to the last member of team one. "What about Sureki Hyuga? Haku dealt with him pretty easily, but that's because…" _I can't just tell people about her weakness,_ Kame chided himself. "She has a great matchup with him."

The Valley genin just shrugged. "He's a taijutsu specialist who doesn't seem to have any speed specialties. Worst-case, he knows how to use rotation, but even then I'll just wear him down from a range."

The two lapsed back into silence, but that was quickly shattered by a familiar voice from behind them. "Oh, come on, that's selling me a little bit short, isn't it?"

Kame was on his feet in an instant, holding his brush like a weapon, while Gunaji had rolled backwards and assumed a taijutsu stance. Standing a few feet away was Sureki Hyuga, who wore an exaggerated pouting expression. "I mean, you guys barely traded like two sentences. Writing me off so quickly?"

Kame opened his mouth but froze, unsure if he should apologize, trash-talk, or walk away. Gunaji seemed equally confused, so it was Sureki who eventually broke the awkward silence. "Aww, c'mon guys, I'm just kidding. Good job getting through the gate yesterday!"

Kame peered at him suspiciously. "Thanks…? You guys did alright as well…"

The Hyuga sighed. "This is unbelievably awkward… I think I'll just get to practicing, if you don't mind?" Kame shook his head, but internally he was perplexed. _Is this guy seriously going to practice right next to us? Where we can see his moves?_

Sureki's pale eyes suddenly hardened, veins appearing around them, and then his face twisted into a smile and he waved to somebody walking up the hill. "Lee-sensei! It's good to see you!"

 _Metal Lee is coming, too?_ Kame stood up, packing up his paperbombs and trying to see what the other boy's Byakugan-enhanced eyes had picked out. After a few seconds, he finally landed on it and gasped, all previous training forgotten. _That's… that's really him, this time!_

Rock Lee was running up the hill in the Lee clan's green bodysuit, smiling and waving back to Sureki. "It is good to see you as well, Sureki! You appear to have arrived early for our lesson… who are these people with you?"

Kame, after clamming up last night, decided that he had to learn to treat even well-known ninja like the humans they were. He cleared his throat, starting to formulate a response, but Sureki beat him to it. "This is Kame, and this is Gunaji. They're Sand and Valley genin who made it through the chunin exams!"

Rock Lee nodded. "Are they here to learn the secrets of the Power of Youth?"

Sureki chuckled nervously. "No, I don't think so, sensei… in fact-"

Kame interrupted the other boy. "How long is your lesson?"

"Umm… we should be done by… twelve-ish. Why?" Sureki appeared confused.

"Because I have a friend who is the pupil of Shira." At the sound of his old friend's name, Rock Lee turned sharply to face Kame. "And I think she'd really love to meet the man that her sensei is always talking about."

"Oh, okay… sure. For now, though, I'm gonna make the most out of my four hours." Sureki assumed a ready stance, and Rock Lee did the same. Kame pulled back out his paperbomb-making supplies, absentmindedly returning to his task while the Leaf's taijutsu master and his apprentice sparred at lightning speed.

Right off the bat, Kame could tell that in terms of speed Sureki was nowhere near Haku. The boy's movement, while quick, were still moving at a snail-like pace when compared to the wickedly fast attacks of his teammate. However, the frail-looking boy seemed to make up for it with extreme skill and perfect technique. Minimalist movements decreased the necessary amount of speed to the point that he could keep up with the godlike Rock Lee.

The green-clad jonin, however, was a completely different story. His movements were faster and stronger Haku's, maybe even faster than Shira's. _So this is how he made jonin-rank without any ninjutsu or taijutsu,_ thought Kame. _He's a monster._ Sureki's extreme skill was no match for Lee's brute physical prowess, but the elder ninja was pulling his blows. Every time he would have landed a hit, he stopped millimeters away from his student and then returned to a neutral stance. Each time this happened, he'd also give the Hyuga a bit of advice on how to improve his taijutsu.

This went on for hours. Kame ran low on chakra and had to stop making bombs, but his stores were well replenished. He had thirty normal paperbombs, ten weakened ones, ten firebombs, ten windbombs, and three smokebombs, likely more than enough for the maximum of four fights that he'd be asked to participate in. After four hours, Sureki and Lee disengaged from their sparring, the former clearly winded and panting.

"Excellent work today, Sureki! The Power of Youth flows ever stronger through your veins, and each day you grow closer to Neji in strength!" Rock Lee and Sureki both bowed, and then they turned to face Kame. "Now then, where is this friend you speak of?" Rock Lee raised one bushy eyebrow.

"Uhh… she went out clothes-shopping, so… do either of you know of any shinobi clothing stores in the Leaf?" The two Leaf ninja shared a look, nodded to each other very seriously, and then wordlessly led the way back down the trail and into the city. Kame quickly shoved his materials into his bag and darted off in pursuit, but Gunaji waved goodbye.

"I think I'm gonna stay here and practice some more." Kame shrugged, turning to follow the strange pair of Leaf shinobi down into their village.


	15. Arc 2 Vol 5: Haku's Changes

**(A/N) Made a cover, will improve it later but overall pretty happy with how it turned out. I also realize now that I forgot disclaimers so... I don't own Naruto.**

 **Ninja Profile: Kosu Iburi**

Ninjutsu: B  
Genjutsu: B  
Taijutsu: D  
Specialties: Incorporeal Form, Evasion, Stealth

Description: Kosu is a slightly short, normally built boy with medium-length white hair and light skin with freckles, a mixed bag of the traits of his Cloud village father and villageless mother. He usually wears casual gray clothing underneath his requisite Cloud shinobi vest, and his eyes are brown. He is absurdly positive about most things and is rarely mean to anyone.

Origin: Kosu is the sole child of Yukimi Iburi, the last member of a clan that was experimented upon by Orochimaru. Their clan's ability to transform into smoke was a curse in disguise, as many younger members were unable to control it and died when wind would disperse them. Eventually, Yukimi overcame the crippling weakness and left to travel the world, eventually settling in the Village Hidden in the Clouds and marrying a Cloud shinobi. Kosu inherited her talent with the Iburi Kekkegenkai and chose to follow the same course as his mother, becoming a shinobi in order to travel around and see the world.

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Kame had to jog to catch up to Sureki and Rock Lee, but eventually he managed to close the gap. Still silent, they walked straight into the downtown district and ended up in front of a store called 'Shinobi Utility Wear'. _Huh, that's a pretty… direct… name,_ thought Kame, but shrugged and entered anyway. Inside, he saw a wide variety of bandages, vests, belts, pouches, and anything else a ninja would ever need to wear.

Towards the back of the shop, in the coat section, Kame spotted Haku, Sagino, Miriki, and Keikiro admiring a few designs. "Hey, Haku!"

She turned to wave back, but then she caught sight of Rock Lee and flashed across the store in milliseconds. "Is… are you… Rock Lee…?" Kame was reminded of his own reaction when he'd seen Naruto and Sasuke.

Rock Lee nodded. "Kame tells me that you are the heir to Shira's Nindo?"

"Yes!" Haku was breathing quickly, staring at Rock Lee like she was trying to figure out if he was real. "Shira-sensei has told me so much about you, Lee-senpai!" She bowed a few times. "I am beyond honored to finally meet you- you are my hero!"

Rock Lee slowly broke out into a smile. "Shira was a great ninja, so you must also be a great successor! What led to your meeting?"

Haku, for once, didn't seem to mind telling another person about her struggles. "I… since I was little, I couldn't use any ninjutsu or genjutsu whatsoever, so I focused on my taijutsu. When my chakra couldn't escape my body, I guess it turned inwards and strengthened me, so taijutsu was always my strong suit…" She turned and nodded at Kame. "Kame spoke with the Lord Kazekage about my situation, and he told us about Shira. After that, we went to Shira's village and convinced him to return to the Sand."

Rock Lee nodded. "Excellent! How is Shira?"

Kame glanced at Haku. "He's… he's doing pretty well, considering… well, his wife, Yome, died. We found him in mourning and he's decided that he'll pass his nindo and secret techniques onto Haku before he joins her."

Rock Lee's face fell at the news that his friend had lost a companion. "I am sad that he lost Yome, but also glad that you could give him purpose once again."

Haku gasped. "Oh, yeah! I remember him saying that if I made it into the final round of the chunin exams, he'd come to watch! You and him could meet back up." That idea perked up the jonin immediately. "Oh, he also asked me to have you look at a technique he taught me, called the Sand Devil. Shira said that it's his own personal adaptation on the Hidden Lotus of your clan."

Rock Lee looked overjoyed at that idea. "Yes! I would love to see this 'Sand Devil'! But first, I notice that you are in this clothing store, which means that you are searching for something better to wear." _Oh, no,_ Kame cringed. _I think I know where this one's going._ "May I recommend my clan's secret, breathable-yet-protective Super Ninja Bodysuit!" He somehow produced a green jumpsuit out of thin air and waved it in front of Haku.

She opened her eyes wide at the sight of it. "Wow, is it really that amazing?"

He nodded, smile growing even larger. "The fabric used is stretchable, but still thick enough to provide _more_ defense than normal ninja clothing! In addition, the Lee Clan Super Ninja Bodysuit is breathable, decreasing excess sweating, while also allowing maximum flexibility!"

Kame couldn't bring himself to stop the conversation- it was like watching an out-of-control cart tumbling down a hill. Before Haku could press it any further, though, Miriki interjected. "Hey, I think that's great. All the girls- I mean, I think everyone here could use one!" _Miriki, you son of a- Throwing me under the bus just so you can get Sagino and Keikiro into skintight jumpsuits!?_ For some reason, Miriki never flirted with Haku like he did every breathing female within a kilometer radius.

Rock Lee ended up being the one who saved the day, though, yanking away the bodysuit and shaking his head. "No, these are only for the ninja who embrace the full Power of Youth like Gai-sensei taught."

Miriki looked crestfallen, stepping away, but Kame breathed a silent sigh of relief. _Maybe next time, pervert._ However, Haku still pointed at the suit and asked, "Can I get that in purple?"

Rock Lee considered it for a second before nodding. "Yes! Although the Lee Clan Super Ninja Bodysuit is traditionally green, you and Shira may bear your own colors!" He marched over to the shopkeeper and gave a few instructions. The elderly woman nodded and disappeared into the back room, then came out almost immediately three folded purple bodysuits in her hands.

 _Wait, Haku's actually going through with this…_ Kame watched as she paid the woman and packed away her new clothing. _Oh, no…_ Rock Lee gave her a double thumbs-up which she returned, and then he asked her, "What weight does Shira have you working at?"

"Huh?" Haku looked confused at that question.

"Your leg weights, how heavy are they?"

"What leg weights?"

Rock Lee actually staggered back a step, seemingly horrified at this development. "What!? Shira does not have you working with leg weights yet? This is terrible, I must speak with him as soon as possible- but for now," he turned to the shopkeeper, "I'd like a set of leg weight holders, leg warmers, and the corresponding weights from twenty to fifty pounds!"

The woman nodded once again, retreated into a hidden room, and emerged with the correct items. _How is she doing that? Does she use a jutsu to size these things, or…?_ While Kame pondered the question, Rock Lee walked Haku through equipping and safely using the leg weights. Her leg warmers were black instead of orange, and they fit nicely over her boots. She took a few experimental steps around the shop, shaking her legs a little bit, and then smiled. "Thank you, Lee-senpai!"

Rock Lee nodded. "It is no problem! My mission is to make sure that the Power of Youth explodes forth from everyone that it can, and you are one of the lucky few!" _He's… somehow even more eccentric than his ninja profile made him out to be_ , Kame thought. _Why are all the jonin such strange people?_

Haku pointed out the door. "Now can I show you the Sand Devil, Lee?"

"Indeed you can, Haku!" Rock Lee and Haku suddenly dashed out the door, presumably towards the training field. Kame was about to tag along when he felt someone grab his shoulder, turning to see that it was Sureki.

"What's the matter?" The Hyuga boy had his byakugan out and seemed… almost worried.

He turned to Kame. "Do you know _how_ Haku lost access to her chakra?"

Kame shook his head. "No, not really. Why? Did you see something?"

Sureki grimaced. "Yeah, and it's… it's bad…" His face was halfway between somber and scared. "Normally, in people like Lee-sensei, you see that their chakra coils are underdeveloped. They just don't have enough chakra to focus any in for jutsu, which even I can see with the byakugan." _Is he poor at byakugan?_ The way he'd phrased that was strange. "But Haku isn't like that. Instead, I can see something else's chakra forming a seal over most of her tenketsu points. I got a feelin earlier during the fight, but just now I confirmed it: Someone definitely sealed off her chakra network."

 _What? Did her family do it? How and why…_ Kame's mind raced, but he saw Rock Lee and Haku disappearing around a street corner outside. "This is a lot to think about… thank you for telling me, though. I'll see you later, Sureki!" He jogged off after them.

By the time he caught up, they were already at the practice field and Haku was just finishing with removing her weights. "Okay, Lee-senpai, I'll try to pull the hits, but-"

Rock Lee shook his head furiously. "No! Do not do that, hit me with all of your youthful energy. I will be able to handle it, trust me."

Haku looked worried but nodded, dropping into her taijutsu stance. Ever since she'd started working with Shira, her stance had changed drastically: She would stand with a slightly bent back leg and a straight front one, sideways to her opponent. Her back arm would be pointed away and then bend back next to her face, while her front arm went low, almost to her knee.

Lee also assumed a more normal stance, and then Haku blurred forward and, in one of the same moves she'd used against Deihaka in the graduation test, went under his arms and upside down. She kicked up a leg into his chin, knocking him flying, and then leapt oddly so that she spun wildly in the air. By the time Lee stabilized in mid-air, she was somersaulting beside him and then extended her leg, slamming the heel down into his midriff. Just like Tetsute, the jonin was launched towards the ground, and Haku kept spinning as she fell, repeating the leg strike on the grounded Lee right as he bounced up slightly. _Haku, that's too much-_ thought Kame, worried that she might actually harm the aging Lee.

Seemingly unworried, she leaped back, resuming a stance, and then Lee stood up and dusted himself off like nothing had happened. He smiled at her and nodded approvingly. "That is an excellent technique, Haku. However, for the initial strike, you only used the power of your legs to launch me. If you put your hands on the ground and push with your arms as well, then you can launch your opponents higher."

Haku nodded. "Thank you, Lee-senpai."

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After they'd exchanged more taijutsu techniques, eventually Haku and Rock Lee said their goodbyes. Kame couldn't squeeze in any more training with most of his chakra gone, so he simply wandered the village. Haku seemed content to come along, leg weights back on, as he explored the place.

They ran into a few other ninja that Kame dimly remembered, but no one that he'd studied extensively. Eventually, the time came for the Kazekage's arrival, which Deihaka had asked them all to be present for, so the pair went to the main gate to stand respectfully before Lord Gaara. Besides the usual jonin and ANBU guards, Kame noticed several familiar faces in the procession: Kankuro and Shira had come out to watch their apprentices.

Gaara met and publicly shook hands with the Hokage, and then the two retired to the Hokage's tower. Shira immediately peeled off and exchanged a few words with Haku, after which they charged off (probably in search of Rock Lee). Kame was left standing next to Miriki, who winced and turned around at the sight of someone coming towards them. The newcomer was tall, black-haired and blue-eyed like Miriki, and wearing a white formal uniform. "Miriki," they said in an aristocratic voice, "Come here, boy. Your parents have tasked me with making sure that you remain presentable _outside_ of your little ninja games at the very least."

Miriki sighed and turned around. "So you're my babysitter?"

"Only if you choose to behave like a baby, cousin." _So this is a Kosuki, Miriki's cousin._ The young man looked to be seventeen or eighteen, several years older than Miriki. "Come over here, you can't just trample around this foreign town like a vagrant."

Miriki glared but did as he was bid, following the man off towards a much nicer hotel than the inn that they'd stayed in the night before. Kame was now alone- Deihaka had almost immediately peeled off to go chat with Senshiko. _This is getting out of hand; he's lapsing in his duties as our teacher now._ Kame brightened up a bit when he saw Kankuro approach, waving and greeting him. "Master! Welcome to the Hidden Leaf, was your travel okay?"

Kankuro grunted. "It could have been worse. Now, how did the combat test go? Explain to me everything you did with Wasp, now."

Kame nodded, then recounted all of the actions and orders he'd put Wasp through. Kankuro appeared mildly proud when Kame told him about his idea to put the Wind Barrier Jutsu around Wasp, and them rolled his eyes and returned to a disappointed look when informed about how it had ripped off the puppet's wings. At the news that Wasp had actually been broken, Kankuro breathed out a long sigh. "Kame, if you broke it the first time you used it-"

"Hey, someone _else_ broke it, master. Besides, it couldn't be helped, I used Wasp to shoot them but it turned out to be a clone, and then they broke it with a kunai strike."

"So what you're saying is, it's not your fault because you fell for a Shadow Clone Jutsu…?" Kankuro was completely unimpressed.

Kame coughed awkwardly, seeking a way out from the conversation. "Oh, wait, I still have the broken parts, thought… so…"

"You want me to fix it? Won't you just break it again?" Kankuro crossed his arms and looked at him expectantly.

"I… I…" Kame tried but failed to think of anything he could say to change his Master's mind- but then relaxed once he saw the man laughing. _Oh, he's messing with me…_

"Take me to the inn, Kame. I'll fix it, if only because I want a chance to witness your skill level first-hand." They went to the small inn, where Kankuro used a summoning jutsu to get a toolkit. It only took him about twenty minutes to fix and then reseal Wasp, after which he departed to stay with the Kazekage. Kame was left alone and found himself wandering back to the practice field absentmindedly.

He stayed there for the rest of the day, working on new Jutsu and techniques until the sun was gone from the sky. Eventually, he headed back to the inn and found the other genin fast asleep, settling into his bedroll and laying down to rest among them.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

 _This is it,_ thought Kame as he walked up to the waiting area. _The final test._ All of the qualifying genin now stood on a platform built into the wall of the arena, looking down into the battlefield. The battlefield itself was a circle, probably a hundred meters in diameter, with a large swath covered in trees. A small, artificial stream trickled across it as well, _probably to give some water users a fighting chance,_ Kame considered. The walls of the arena curved upwards and inwards a little bit, and then the observers were above them. _There's probably… what, a couple thousand people? To watch genin matches?_

Up in the stands, there was a smaller balcony that he knew must house the Hokage, Kazekage, Taniakage, and Raikage. _I guess it's good for Gaara that he had both of his teams pass, huh?_ Kame pondered the village's relationships for a moment, as the proctor had yet to appear. _After the Fourth Shinobi World War, there's been a shaky peace between all of the villages, but I still get the feeling that any of them would happily see their rivals wiped out._ Kame remembered meeting Gaara and Naruto in person, and revised his judgement. _Okay, maybe not the Sand or the Leaf, but…_

He'd looked into all the sitting Kage, although some had less readily available information than others. The Taniakage in particular was almost a complete mystery, like several of the smaller villages' kage- they had survived for many years by flying under the radar, and through a system of mutually assured destruction. _If the Sand attacked the Valley,_ Kame reasoned, _then we'd almost definitely win… but then any of the other Great Villages could come in and destroy us._ _It's what happened to Heat Devil Village, after all._

Eventually, a door opened and a jonin strode out onto the practice field. Kame didn't recognize them, and they weren't wearing any recognizable clan markings or distinctive clothing. All in all, it was a little bit refreshing to see a jonin-level ninja that wasn't a complete nutcase. After the man reached the center of the field, he bellowed out (probably using some sort of voice amplification jutsu) "Greetings, gathered observers and shinobi! Welcome to the culminating final of this year's chunin exam!"

A scattered round of applause died out, and he continued. "The tournament will follow a bracket system, where the winners of four smaller pools will battle in twos and then finally the two best shinobi will fight one another!" He stepped back and made a few handsigns, then a visible image flickered into being on the ground before him. _Is he some sort of… leadership specialist? What's with all the presentational jutsu?_ "Without further ado, here is the lineup for the exams!"

Kame peered anxiously at the image. Pool one was comprised of two matches: One between Haku and Zandeina, and one between Tetsute and Kosu. The winners of those smaller ones would likely fight one another. Pool two's matchups were Sureki vs Sagino and Kakuzen vs Gunaji. _Ouch, that's an incredibly bad matchup for Sagino,_ thought Kame. In the other half, pool three had Miriki vs Rakuyo, and then just Dako. _There's only fifteen, so I guess he just gets a pass on the first round?_

The final pool, pool four, consisted of Naruko vs Keikiro and Kame vs Genji. _I'm probably going to end up fighting Naruko early on, then…_ Kame readied himself mentally for that. The spectators clapped with each revealed name, and then the projection split into four separate copies and spread out onto the walls, spaced equidistantly around the battlefield. The proctor turned towards the balcony where the genin stood and called out, "Haku of the Hidden Sand, and Zandeina Ryukana of the Hidden Cloud! Please descend and prepare for battle!"

 _Here we go,_ Kame worried. He turned and tried to give Haku as reassuring of a smile as he could manage at the moment, watching her disappear down the steps. Zandeina chose a different tactic and simply ran straight down the arena wall, as if to reinforce her and Haku's skill gap. _Wait… Ryukana… I remember where I heard that name now! This is very bad…_ Kame's eyes drifted up to the Kage's box and where the Fifth Raikage, Darui _Ryukana_ , sat.

 _Haku's up against Hidden Cloud royalty… and her ace in the hole is a lightning technique, but she's up against another lightning specialist. In fact, that blue lightning I saw during stage two was probably the famous Storm Release kekkegenkai…_ Kame bit his lip nervously, considering Haku's situation. _With no jutsu, she has to close in to close range, but from what I've seen Zandeina is great at close-quarters incapacitation._ Standing there facing each other, they seemed like polar opposites: Haku, standing pale and wearing bandages with a top and skirt (she'd agreed to only wear the Lee Clan Super Ninja Bodysuit during training) stood with a distinctive taijutsu stance. Zandeina, on the other hand, was covered head to toe in her heavy gray cloak and stood leaning to one side, apparently uninterested in the task at hand.

"Alright, contestants… Go!" The proctor shouted the word and then leaped back, leaving the space between the two kunoichi empty- but not for long. Almost immediately, Zandeina shouted, "Storm Style: Crackling Doom!" _So the voice amplification jutsu affects the contestants as well, then,_ Kame realized. The distinctive blue lightning streamed forward from her fingers and closed in on Haku, who was forced to dart backwards awkwardly. At about twenty meters, though, the lightning fizzled out. _So she has a maximum range that Haku can try to avoid…_

Haku continued moving backwards until she was near the wall, and then entered a long dash going clockwise around the edge of the arena. _She's not generating any offense… yet._ Kame approved the choice, _it's a good idea to get your opponent to reveal as many cards as possible before you tip your own hand._

Zandeina growled and threw out another of her Storm attacks, but at Haku's range she was able to evade it with ease. Finally, Haku reached the treeline and then leapt up into the leaves, concealing herself from view. _If her win condition is to close to melee range, and Zandeina doesn't know that, then she might have a chance for a sneak attack. But… that's pretty hopeful. This is a shinobi, and an attack from the trees is almost a staple._

As he'd assumed, Zandeina remained cautious to enter the treeline, stalking around the perimeter and searching for a glimpse of her opponent. A few times, she unleashed storm release attacks, but nothing hit and the match remained a stalemate. The stalemate broke, though, when she made the mistake of stopping to remove her hooded cloak. Haku was upon her in a millisecond, throwing out a vicious uppercut- which crunched into the large rock Zandeina had replaced herself with. The rock shattered into pieces, drawing a gasp from the audience, but the Cloud kunoichi was unimpressed. "Storm Style: Laser Circus!"

A halo of lightning appeared around her hands and then shot forward towards Haku. Haku tried to dodge but Zandeina turned the beams to track her target, closing and landing a direct hit on Haku. Haku froze and shuddered in place as she was shocked for a good four seconds, until Zandeina released the jutsu and started to walk forward, removing her cloak fully. Underneath, her resemblance to the Raikage was noticeable; her dark skin and light hair framing a hard face that was twisted in derision. "You should probably just stay down, Sand girl."

However, Kame knew that Haku would never knew that, and was unsurprised (if still afraid) when his teammate shakily rose to her feet. "No." Haku rolled backwards and reached down, detaching the weights from her legs. Kame had heard stories of Gaara and Rock Lee's fight during the chunin exams from Kankuro, and had an image in his mind of the removal of the leg weights being a huge turning point. However, Haku's weights simply fell to the ground with a clunk, much unlike the tales he'd heard of Rock Lee's weights crashing into the ground hard enough to shatter solid rock.

Zandeina looked at the weights, raising an eyebrow. "What is this? Did you come out here handicapping yourself?" She turned back towards Haku angrily. "Ohh… now you've done it. Treating me like some punching bag for you to train yourself on was a terrible mistake." She threw out a hand to her left and shouted, "Storm Style: Tyrant Whip!" A long stream of lightning extended from her grip, stretching out to maybe ten feet. The Cloud genin spun it around and snapped it a few times in the way that made clear her skill with the weapon.

"I'm not dismissing your skill, I just want to improve to be able to surpass people like you- if I could do it with weights on, then the extra challenge would be a great way to strengthen myself." Haku spoke calmly, slowly backing away from her enraged opponent.

"Surpass me? _Me?_ " _I guess that was the wrong thing to say…_ "I'm the daughter of the Raikage, heir to the Storm Release kekkegenkai and prodigy of the Hidden Cloud! How's this for an 'extra challenge'!?" Zandeina swung the whip forward and it extended far longer than it should have, forcing Haku to duck underneath it. Expertly, she pulled the whip back in and snapped it forward again, this time in a straight line, and Haku again had to jump back to dodge it.

 _Oh, crap,_ Kame thought, realizing what the Lightning shinobi's plan was. _Haku's in a bad spot-_ and she was, because she'd been forced backwards by the constant attacks until she was up against the arena wall. _Now she can only dodge in three directions._ Zandeina smirked and shouted, "Storm Style: Crackling Doom!" The jutsu spread out in a flat cone before her, covering any attempts to move to the left or right. Haku was forced to leap straight up and over the attack, but helpless in midair as she was, Zandeina was free to swing the whip at her.

This time, it made solid contact with her leg, and a vicious yank brought Haku crashing down into the earth. The Sand kunoichi made a valiant effort to stand, but Zandeina pulled on the whip once again, taking out Haku's feet from under her. "Storm Style: Heaven Execution!" _That doesn't sound good._ Kame started forward a little bit when he saw the gathering of storm chakra over where Haku lay prone. After a few seconds, all of it struck down towards the ground, but Haku rolled out of the way in the nick of time. The spot where she'd been was left as a smoking black blast crater. _If she takes a direct hit from that, then she's done for,_ thought Kame. _Come on Haku, find a way out of that whip._

Haku appeared to share his line of thinking, glancing down at the lightning whip attached to her leg. Then a strange smile appeared on her face and, still prone on the ground, she kicked her leg up and towards her. Zandeina was ripped forward and flung over to where Haku lay, and upon her arrival was met with a brutal kick to the midsection that sent her flying out into the open air. She lost her grip on the whip and it spluttered out, freeing Haku.

With her opponent now in midair, Haku grinned and launched into her Sand Devil attack, spinning forwards and over the Cloud ninja. The first strike connected and sent Zandeina streaking down onto the earth, but as Haku descended after her, she seemed to regain enough lucidity to make a series of seals. "Lightning Style: Thunder Cage!" A web of lightning crackled to life around her on the ground, and when Haku's leg came down onto it, the smaller girl was blasted back and rolled to a halt ten meters away.

When the two ninja took to their feet, Haku was clearly the worse for the wear, breathing heavily and marked up with ash and dirt from the attacks she'd suffered. Zandeina, on the other hand, seemed almost pristine. Her white skirt beneath her Cloud vest was completely clean, and she stood just as confidently as she had when the fight started. However, what _had_ changed was her expression. _She's… she must be like Naruko, angry about people she considers 'weak' holding their own against her…_

"Alright, _Haku_ ," Zandeina spat. "You've had your little fun running around. If you don't use a jutsu, I'm going to hurt you." Haku opened and closed her mouth, glancing briefly towards the crowds of people watching and murmuring. _She doesn't want to say that she can't do it in front of all these strangers, especially not when she's being judged for promotion to chunin rank._ "What? Am I not worth your goddamn jutsu!? I'll make you regret treating me like a joke!"

Zandeina flashed through a long series of seals, and the air around her started crackling with electricity. Finally, she slammed her palms together and said, in a low and hateful voice far more terrifying than her yells, "Storm Style: Breath of the Lightning Dragon." The chakra condensed over her head, forming into the shape of a massive dragon's head. The jaw opened, and then out poured a huge wave of storm release lightning, tearing across the ground and hitting Haku square-on.

The attack was over as soon as it had started, leaving Haku actually _smoking_ as she stood there weakly. _Is it over?_ Kame thought, leaning forward anxiously. Then she twitched a little bit and coughed, starting to move-

Another volley of lightning tore out from the dragon's maw, and then another. Haku was mercilessly blasted over and over again, crying out in pain and shocked too much to move. After five rounds, Zandeina paused again. "Had enough? Come on, you little whore, hit me with something. Lightning, Fire, Water, I don't care. I won't be disrespected like this in front of my father!"

Haku coughed out, "I'm not-" but Zandeina didn't let her finish, starting into another round of lightning attacks. _How is Haku still standing?_ wondered Kame. A little part of him whispered that she should just give in, fall over and lose the match, but the majority of his mind was simply torn- _I don't want to watch her hurt by losing in the first round, but I also can't watch her in pain like this._ _This Zandeina girl is…"_

Suddenly, Kosu was standing beside him. "I'm sorry."

Kame ripped his eyes from the battle to glance at the Cloud genin quizzically. "What?"

The thin boy looked at the field sadly. "Zandeia has always pushed herself to excel, but she lets that dream lead her into doing despicable things." Another blast of lightning from the battlefield lit up the bitter expression that Kosu wore. "She used to be less… like this, but that was back when everyone treated her like a princess. Eventually, we got put into a genin squad with Torino-sensei, who treated her just like he treated everyone else. They fought all the time, and she's just been getting angrier and angrier over the last couple of years. He finally agreed that we were ready for the chunin exams this year, and she sees this as her chance to escape him."

Kame turned away from the other genin. "So she's just angry about not being spoiled? That's my teammate, my _friend_ out there getting electrocuted in front of a crowd of thousands, and that's your excuse?"

Kosu set his mouth in a line, seemingly lost for words. Kame gripped the railing tightly, his morbid curiosity forcing him to watch every round of Haku's torment. _If I end up against Zandeina, I'll… I'll…_

Zandeina finally let up once more, and Haku collapsed to the ground lifelessly. "Huh. You really thought you could do it without jutsu right up until the end, didn't you? You idiot. You just _had_ to make sure that I didn't look good, didn't you? Hopefully my-" She stopped talking when Haku slowly but surely raised herself into a kneeling position. "What the hell- nobody can take that and still be able to move!"

Kame's knuckles went white as Haku painfully lifted herself onto her feet. _If she takes any more, she'll…_ He couldn't stop himself from calling out, "Haku! Stop, don't do it. Just…" _Let her win_ , he thought, but couldn't put into words. "Please, don't sacrifice yourself like this…"

She turned around to weakly smile at him. "I won't lose, not like this. You chose me, Shira chose me, Rock Lee chose me. If I lose in the first round, I'm failing all of you." As she spoke, something strange happened- her eyes changed. Tiny black lines appeared in a circle around the edges of her eyes, gradually forcing their way inwards in a spiraling pattern. They slowed to a stop about halfway to her pupil, touching the edges of her purple iris. _Is that… her kekkegenkai?_

Seemingly unaware of what she'd unlocked, Haku turned back to Zandeina. "You want me to use elemental jutsu to fight you? Fine, then." She assumed a different stance, now angled forwards with her arms back behind her. "Lightning Stance!" The familiar aura of lightning energy crackled to life around her, causing Zandeina to step back a little bit.

However, the Cloud kunoichi soon recovered. "Lightning? It won't help you." She shouted and the dragon spat another blast of storm energy at Haku. _Even if she found a second wind somehow, in her state another round of that might kill her!_ Kame's eyes widened, though, at what happened next.

The storm release lightning arced forward towards Haku, but upon nearing her it _slowed_ somehow and swirled around her, spinning inwards until it met her hands. She remained completely unharmed even as Zandeina defiantly launched another barrage of attacks, each one seemingly negated. _Is this the chakra-consumption kekkegenkai? She's using it in front of all the Kage; this could be bad…_ but Kame's thoughts trailed off, too enthralled by the events unfolding before him to consider any lasting consequences.

Zandeina's attacks stopped, and she appeared to be breathing heavily, perhaps nearing her own limit. "What the hell is this!? That's just cheating, you-"

In a crackle of electricity, Haku flashed behind her opponent. Zandeina turned, far too slowly to do anything, as Haku reached forwards and grabbed her by the sides. Upon the physical contact, Zandeina seemed to freeze from a shock of some sort. Then, in another flash too fast to track with the eyes, Haku suplexed the cloud girl so hard that a cloud of dust was knocked up and obscured the area.

When it cleared, Haku was standing haggardly, all traces of lightning stance or kekkegenkai gone, but Zandeina was crumpled up on the ground. There were actual cracks in the dirt where she'd been thrust head-first, and an expression of shock was locked on her unconscious face. The proctor stepped over gingerly, checked her, and then turned around with an expression of disbelief on his face. "Winner by knockout: Haku!"

The arena erupted into confused cheering, quiet at first but growing in volume as more and more people fully realized what had happened. Kosu's jaw dropped, and he sagged a little bit into the railing of the balcony. "What… but… without even using any jutsu, she…"

 _I think I'll let him keep thinking that she's only half-trying…_ Kame smiled wide, watching Haku walk off of the field waving at the crowds. _I guess me and Miriki have to win our rounds as well, now._


	16. Arc 2 Vol 6: Untouchable

**Ninja Profile: Dako Nakimoka**

Ninjutsu: A  
Genjutsu: C  
Taijutsu: B  
Specialties: Gyuki, Stamina, Power

Description: Dako Nakimoka stands an imposing six foot two inches, especially due to his only being seventeen. He is built very solidly with a lot of muscle mass and wears knee and forearm guards over his basic Cloud shinobi clothing. He is usually sullen and quiet, replying with a bare minimum of words, and only really shows any respect for his teammate Zandeina.

Origin: Dako Nakimoka was born to two normal Cloud shinobi and had a fairly normal childhood, up until the tragic death of Killer B. On his deathbed, Dako's idol made him an offer: to transfer the seal of Gyuki the Eight-Tails and become the next jinchuriki of the Village Hidden in the Clouds. Dako accepted, and from a young age showed a surprisingly great level of control over the spirit within him. Because of this, and because Killer B chose him, he was not made an outcast like so many other jinchuriki and actually found acceptance in the people around him. Eventually, he was placed onto a team with Zandeina (the top student) and Kosu (the bottom student), and spent the next three years growing in strength as a shinobi and trying to find the same kind of bond with Gyuki that his mentor had.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

When Haku emerged onto the viewing platform, Kame was the first to greet her. "Haku, that was amazing! You didn't tell me that the stance changes let you _absorb_ the chakra of that element!"

She blushed a little bit and looked away towards the ground. "I… I didn't know it either."

Miriki stepped over, holding his hand up for a high-five. "Nice one, Haku- but did you have to hit that Zandeina girl in the face? I mean, you ruined a perfectly good-"

Kame put his hand over the Kosuki boy's face and muffled the rest of that sentence. "Anyway, the next match is Tetsute and the Kosu guy, I think." Miriki nodded, and they started to move back towards the balcony to observe the next fight, but Kame hesitated- Tetsute was walking over towards the staircase.

 _I shouldn't have left things like I did._ "Hey, Tetsute."

The other boy narrowed his eyes and turned. "What."

"I…" _Spit it out, Kame._ "I just wanted to wish you luck… in your fight."

Tetsute looked briefly confused before turning away to continue down the stairs. "Thanks," he said, almost inaudibly quiet.

 _I need to finish what I started at some point,_ Kame thought. _It's not good for anyone involved to keep him as an enemy…_ but images of Tetsute treating Haku like garbage kept appearing in Kame's mind, and he couldn't stifle the disgust. _Not right now. I can't forgive him in such a short time, even if he was acting out of some misplaced friendship with me._

He joined his two squadmates at the railing, looking down into the arena where the still-in-disbelief Kosu was squaring off against Tetsute. The proctor waved his hand between them, shouting: "Ready? Go!"

Tetsute immediately flashed through a set of seals that Kame knew all too well and then slammed his hands on the ground. "Earth Style: Quicksand Sea Jutsu!" The earth softened in a wave coming out from where he'd touched, rippling into a liquid-like state and forcing Kosu to desperately dodge backwards. Once the jutsu reached its maximum range, he slowed down a little bit and appeared to take a breather, scanning the area… but Tetsute was gone.

For a few seconds, Kosu looked around the arena frantically, confusion clear on his face. However, despite his searching, the Cloud genin never even saw it coming when Tetsute's hands emerged from the dirt around his feet. "Earth Style: Headhunter Jutsu!" Kosu disappeared into the ground as Tetsute emerged, and in the blink of an eye he was up to his neck. Tetsute cockily swung an arm around as if to loosen himself up, and then pulled a shuriken and held it to the other boy's forehead. "Feel like conceding?"

Kosu, oddly enough, smirked at that. "Nah, not just yet." He appeared to concentrate for a moment, and then he simply disappeared into a puff of smoke like a shadow clone- but instead of dissipating, the smoke streamed around Tetsute and reformed behind him. "What about you?" he asked, brandishing his kunai in a reversal of their previous positions.

Tetsute grimaced and threw himself backwards into his attacker, sending them tumbling to the ground. The kunai stabbed into his head, but rather than blood, dirt fell away from the wound, and then 'Tetsute' fell apart completely into clods of earth. Another Tetsute rose from the earth, grinning from ear to ear. "Now I've got you. Earth Style: Earth Clone Prison Jutsu." The clone's loose dirt solidified suddenly, trapping Kosu underneath the solid mass of soil.

However, the cloud genin just used the same jutsu to escape, dissolving into mist but retreating rather than attacking. For a little while, there was a peace between the two as they prowled to the sides, both probably formulating plans as best they could with their newfound information. _Tetsute needs to stall this out and hope that Kosu's smoke defense eats up a lot of chakra; because as an earth and fire release user there's no way he could possibly attack the gas form._

Tetsute seemed to share the sentiment, dropping the jutsu tactic and simply pelting the smoky Kosu with kunai and shuriken, forcing him to remain incorporeal. However, Kosu didn't appear to be in any trouble at all- in fact, he seemed content to sit there as a cloud for minutes on end. Kame, with a nagging suspicion in the back of his mind, stepped over to the remaining Cloud genin, Dako. "Hey, Dako… so… how long can Kosu stay like that?"

The larger boy turned to stare at Kame for a few awkward seconds before answering an a sullen voice. "Forever."

 _What? That… shouldn't be possible._ Kame was at a loss for words. _If he could remain in that invulnerable state forever, then… How is anyone supposed to beat him!?_ "That's… What kind of Jutsu lasts forever?"

"Not a Jutsu."

 _If it's not a Jutsu, then… a kekkegenkai?_ "I've never heard of that kekkegenkai before."

Dako sighed and turned back to the fight. "Kosu and his mother are the only ones who have it. And before you pester me any more, can you just watch the fight like everyone else is?"

Kame returned to where he'd stood before, more subdued now. Looking back down into the battlefield, things were going very poorly for Tetsute. He appeared to have run out of projectile weaponry and was breathing more slowly, while Kosu was still untouchable. The Cloud boy eventually solidified again, twirling a kunai and whistling happily. "You about done, Tetsute? I'm kinda getting bored…"

Tetsute grimaced. "Not just yet." He darted forward, preparing another jutsu, and Kame gasped a little bit at the intense feel of chakra radiating from his old friend's hands. _That's… probably everything he has…_ Whatever this jutsu was, it would probably determine the fight. "Earth Style: Badlands!" The ground around his feet cracked and split, spreading out almost all the way across the arena and turning it into a desert terrain. "And now, Fire Style: Pits of Hell Jutsu!" He slammed his hands onto the altered earth and it sizzled, sending a visible wave of heat roiling outwards and actually making the cracks in the ground glow from heat.

He looked completely spent, but his combination jutsu had turned the arena into a sizzling wasteland. Kosu, for some reason, opened his eyes wide in panic and when Tetsute charged, he _didn't_ go into a smoke form. The two went into melee combat, but Tetsute was clearly the superior in that regard, and in a few quick strikes the Cloud genin was disarmed and raised his hands in submission.

"I… forfeit." Kosu didn't seem all that upset, and by the time he stepped out of the arena, his face had regained its ever-present smile. Tetsute, ironically, walked back towards the viewing balcony looking far more taxed and unhappy than his defeated opponent. The crowd cheered less than they had for Haku's come-from-behind victory, which wasn't surprising- this last fight had been a lot less of a show. Tetsute had attacked constantly until he'd found a way to win, with no twists or turns.

 _Wait, how did he win?_ Kame looked back at the arena, and then he realized: with the ground superheated, an updraft had formed and was blowing stray leaves up into the air. _Kosu's smoke form would have been forced up and out of the arena, eliminating him by ring-out and maybe even killing him if he couldn't keep himself together._ Kame had to admit, Tetsute may have been a bad person, but he was a pretty good ninja. _I think this means that he's going up against Haku next… that's going to be intense._

Back in the fighting area, the proctor yelled, "Earth Style: Earthen Memory Jutsu!" and the sizzling pit rippled and reshaped itself to reassume the lightly grassy form it had held before. _That's pretty useful for a tournament,_ Kame thought. Once the arena was back the way it had been, the proctor looked up at the wall and then shouted, "Next Match: Sureki Hyuga against Sagino Kokuseki!"

Kame settled in to watch the rest of the fights. Sagino and Sureki's match had been a quick one- As a defensive brawler, Sagino had very little options against the smaller boy's Gentle Fist. After having all her chakra points in both arms disabled, she'd forfeited the fight. Next had been Gunaji and Kakuzen, who had traded Earth and Wood release Jutsu at each other. Gunaji had used the Firebombs, which gave him a serious edge in the fight, but not enough to push him all the way to victory. Kakuzen's near-impenetrable defense had held firm and Gunaji was ground into submission.

Next was Miriki and Rakuyo, which was a… strange… fight. Miriki had flirted with her constantly for the entire time, making her angrier and angrier, and she'd met his words with kunai and shuriken attacks, even throwing in a few lightning jutsu. Due to the taunts, though, her aim was off just enough for Kame's teammate to avoid them. Finally, he'd used his Hatogan and asked if the reason she was so angry was that she didn't want to look bad in front of Tetsute, which froze her up long enough for him to hit her with a real paralysis genjutsu and disqualify her.

And then, it was Kame's turn. He dimly heard Miriki and Haku wishing him luck, barely registering Tetsute's simple nod, and made his way onto the field lost in his thoughts. _Miriki and Haku both won their matches, I will not be the weak link_. He looked up at Genji, who was looking at him intensely. The other boy sighed and said, "Both of my teammates are out, huh? And both of yours had upset victories. Figures."

Funnily enough, Genji's casual attitude helped to lift a little bit of the stress of of Kame's shoulders. "Hey, you can still do your best, right?"

"I guess. Heh," Genji laughed, "I just realized- Tetsute gave you a nod, didn't he? That's funny, because he didn't do anything for me. Honestly," he said, dropping into a conspiratorial whisper, "This team kinda sucks. Rakuyo and Tetsute are such elitists, you know? Nowhere near as funny as Miriki. They have such high expectation for themselves, all the time, but… there aren't really any expectations for me…" Genji trailed off as the proctor stepped forward, sending out the hand in a familiar motion and than raising it.

"Ready? Go!"

The instant the words left the proctor's mouth, Genji had already torn through five handsigns and shouted: "Wind Blade Jutsu!" Kame had to desperately turn around, back to his opponent (a cardinal sin for a shinobi) in order to escape the sudden attack. From behind him, he heard Genji finish his earlier sentence. "So I guess I'd better start setting higher expectations for myself then. Maybe if I beat you here, I can earn their respect. Wind Blade Jutsu!" Sheer luck saved Kame as the other boy's second attack clipped the side of his leg but didn't do any real damage.

Kame spun back around once he'd gained enough distance, only to sorely regret it as Genji had kept up with him and was swinging a short sword in an arc towards his midsection. He drew a kunai and blocked the attack near the hilt, using the leverage in order to stop the larger blade from biting into his side. _Okay, this might work, now I just… Oh, son of a mother f-_

He'd forgotten to take Wasp down with him. (In the stands, although Kame couldn't see it, Kankuro was wondering why he'd ever taken the idiotic boy on as an apprentice.) _How could I make such a stupid, rookie mistake? That's not even a rookie mistake, it's a pre-academy-graduation move._ He'd just have to win this fight without using any of his puppet jutsu. _I can do this. Get some distance, keep him on his toes._

Kame readied the Gale Force Jutsu in his free hand- a nice thing about that jutsu in particular was that it only took one hand to cast, due to its relative simplicity. Genji appeared to realize what was going on, but it was far too late. Kame swung the hand around and shouted, "Gale Force Jutsu!" blowing both genin away from each other. He landed relatively athletically, stopping himself before he hit the arena wall, while Genji somehow stabilized himself in midair and hit the ground running.

The team seven genin started in a wide arc, maintaining his distance from Kame even as he walked towards the middle of the arena. _I have to keep my dodging options open; it's more important than having the wall behind me._ Once Kame reached a spot about thirty meters out from the wall, Genji increased in speed until he was nearing Haku-levels of sprinting power. Sounding out from all around Kame, his opponent's voice was weirdly gleeful: "I was saving this one to impress Miriki, but I think this is as good a time as any to use it!"

Kame readied a Wind Barrier in case this attack was a projectile-based one, forcing himself to calm down and prepare himself for whatever was coming. When the attack finally released, though, it was far beyond his ability to stop it. "Wind Style: Hurricane Execution Dance!" Genji blurred and disappeared into winds so extreme that they were visible. A tornado spun into existence all around Kame, pinning him in on all sides. Then the wind blades came, flying in from unpredictable angles and forcing him to dive around just barely avoiding them.

 _Crap… This is bad._ Kame pulled out and folded a Windbomb while ducking underneath another wind blade. _Huh, I guess the multitasking training with Master Kankuro extends to more than just Puppet Style._ He released the paper airplane towards the wall, intending to dispel enough of the jutsu to blow a hole for him to escape through- but the plane was sent astray and then shredded by the intense winds. _Of course, idiot-_

While he reprimanded himself, one of the wind blades came in low and blindsided the back of his knee. He'd dodged it just barely enough to avoid a broken bone, but he was still thrown to the ground and pain shot up his left side. _Shit, if I don't escape this soon I'm done for._ _Think, what can you do? There's nothing visible to substitute out with, so how else can I… I've got it._ He sent up a quick prayer to all the watching gods to not make him regret what he was about to do, and then plastered another Windbomb to the floor beneath him.

He jumped as high as he could, avoiding another wind blade in the process, and when he reached the peak of his leap, he braced himself as best as he could and made the seal to detonate the bomb.

The blast sent him flying, drawing out a gasp of pain as his already-hurt leg was yanked painfully. It didn't seem to stop Genji's jutsu, but the other boy stopped it himself when Kame left it. When Kame gathered himself, he took stock of the situation: _I'm ten meters above the ground, losing forward momentum, and there's a tree where I should be landing._ He narrowed his eyes and tried his best to recall the jutsu he'd invented the night before.

Yesterday, he'd been thinking: _In the last couple of serious fights, I've blown myself around with bombs and jutsu. I know how to condense and unleash wind chakra, so it should be possible to just make an easier version of the Gale Force Jutsu, and let it out around my feet, right?_ Of course, it hadn't been that easy, as the feet were some of the hardest chakra points to use for anything. However, through a _lot_ of practice and falling off of tree branches, he'd managed to get a solid start.

 _Hopefully it's solid enough,_ he thought, channeling chakra into the soles of his feet and applying the change of nature as he released it, "Wind Style: Wind Cushion Jutsu!" The resulting swirl of air was strong enough to slow him down, but it was a new jutsu and he'd misjudged the necessary amount. Still, a crash that should have broken his bones on the wooden branches was instead a crash that bruised his flesh on those same branches. Kame stood, using chakra to seal his feet to the tree and peering around to catch a glimpse of Genji.

Kame was briefly distracted by a small murmur that went through the crowd- _I think they know that I made that one up._ He flushed with pride and _once again_ his pride cost him- Genji shouted, "Wind Blade Jutsu!" from directly below him and he felt the branch that he stood on break off the tree. _He must have thought that one up since the last time we fought._

Still, now that he was out of the jutsu, Kame was able to see the large rocks along the edges of the river that were almost definitely put there to facilitate jutsu. With a quick reach of his chakra and a shout of "Substitution!", Kame was standing next to the river and watched with a little bit more humor than he'd like to admit when the rock he'd swapped with fell towards Genji. The other boy had to dive to get out of the way, standing up and dusting himself off.

"You know, Tetsute and Rakuyo definitely didn't undersell you," Genji said. Kame briefly lost focus as he thought about that statement- _I knew that they wanted me back, but… were they talking about me behind my back? With Genji?_ He instinctively turned around to the balcony where Tetsute stood, which was a mistake. "Wind Blade Jutsu!" Kame grunted as he felt something hit his midsection and send him flying. _Crap, I… wait, I'm still conscious, and I don't think I broke anything. Is he running out of chakra?_

"Damn, I messed up on that one." Genji winced, "I guess I gotta learn to not get distracted by my own banter." _Miriki must have taught him that,_ Kame realized. "Oh well, I guess you're back out in the open, so…" _Shit!_ Kame sprinted towards the far treeline, reaching it before Genji could trap him in another tornado. _He's not very good at mid-fight talking…_

"Go, Kame!" Kame heard Haku shout, remembering this time not to turn away from his opponent, but couldn't stop the smile from making it onto his face. _Thanks, Haku._ _I think it's about time that I go on the offensive, now…_ He reached into his pocket and removed two weakened paperbombs, folding and sending them off towards Genji while drawing a shuriken. _If he commits to a dodge or to shooting them out of the sky, I can throw the shuriken._

However, the Sand genin did neither, instead flashing through another set of handsigns. Kame had to take a moment to fully appreciate the sheer speed and technique of Genji's handsigns- he was even faster than Deihaka was. _His family owns a… that's right, they do all the paperwork for the Hidden Sand. I guess that growing up with a family of grunt-work writers gave him that speed._ After mere seconds but tens of signs, Genji thrust a hand out in front of him: "Wind Style: Sword of the Hero!" _That's similar to the jutsu Zandeina used…_

In his open hand, wind swirled faster and faster until it condensed into a katana-shaped form. Genji assumed a stance and then, in the blink of an eye and before Kame could react, swung the blade forward. Where he'd slashed, a wave of wind cut through the air itself and completely shredded the paper airplanes. _Ugh, back to the defense it is, then._

Kame took brief stock of his situation. He was down to eight weakened paperbombs and eight Windbombs- _probably the most valuable ones, since they're the ones I can safely hit these enemies with without injuring them and disqualifying myself._ His chakra was at a reasonable level, perhaps twenty or twenty-five percent depleted. The jutsu he used were all fairly low on chakra usage, so the only times he ever really ran out was on his paperbomb-production days. His body was about the same- he was a little bit winded and his leg hurt from the hit it had taken, but he could still operate at close to full capacity.

Genji started forwards, sword at his side as if he were a samurai. _I know this technique- Laido?_ Kame (during a phase in his childhood where he'd decided that he was going to be a taijutsu specialist) had looked into various weapons and their associated fighting styles. The style Genji appeared to be using was called Laido, and was focused around quick strikes from a sheathed position and then a return to the neutral sheathed stance. _That means that he's unlikely to chain several attacks together- I'll keep that in mind._

Kame moved back into the trees, confident that his opponent's wide wind attacks would be crippled inside the dense forest. However, as Genji approached, a flash of his arms sent another cut forward, cutting cleanly through several tree trunks before him. _Okay, so hiding in the treeline isn't an option. What can I do, here? He's got me trapped, and I can't see any substitution targets. Haku's watching this from just a little bit away, I can't-_

 _Wait._ The balcony was only about ten meters from the ground , and five meters to Kame's left. _If I can…_ he extended a chakra thread, stretching it out through the stone of the arena wall, up towards the balcony, bumping into another person's chakra, before settling on Wasp. _Okay, now we're in business._ Despite flying blind, Kame knew what direction Wasp was facing and how high it had to go to clear the railing, so he guided it carefully until it appeared in the corner of his vision.

Genji was rapidly approaching, and the proctor would most likely call the match if he could get swing it near Kame's neck (stopping it before killing him, obviously). _I can't let that happen,_ he thought, and sent Wasp streaking off towards the center of the arena at breakneck speed. Once it was close enough to the ground, Kame shouted, "Substitution!" and swapped with the little construct. _Wait, if Genji breaks it, Master Kankuro's never going to let me hear the end of it,_ he thought as he turned around.

However, rather than attack the puppet, Genji had instantly dashed straight for him the second he'd cast the substitution. _Shit, I miscalculated badly-_ but it was too late. The wind sword fell from the genin's hands as he flashed through a set of signs for the second time, and Kame was powerless to escape the hurricane that swirled to life around him. Out in the middle of the arena now, there was nothing to substitute to, and to his horror he saw that Genji was somehow arching the edges of the wind wall upwards and inwards. In addition, the wall was a chakra construct, snapping his chakra thread off of Wasp when it entered existence.

The wind blades started coming in fast and hard, leaving Kame helpless to do anything but dodge and hope that a plan revealed itself. _When he's in that wall, I can't see him, so I can't target him with anything. Paperbombs thrown at the wall are useless, but if I detonate them near me, then I'll get caught in the blast- besides, the only way that a blast from here is going to stop him is if I hit him directly, but he's invisible. If I hit the whole wall… no, it's impossible. I don't have any bombs that are big enough._

Then a plan, a ridiculous plan, came to Kame, and he almost laughed. "Alright, it's the end of the line," he said while dodging another wind blade. He reached into his pocket, but instead of pulling a single bomb out of the dispenser, he forced the jaws open and grabbed _all of them_. Swinging his hand upwards, the stack of normal paperbombs spread itself out in a long line, still attached at the edges to make a chain. Imagining how stupid he must look, Kame spun in a circle, and the thirty paperbombs spread into a spiraling ribbon stretching around his body several times.

 _They should all arm now that they're out of the suppressing pouch, and I made them to be directed-blast types. Genji, this is probably going to hurt… sorry._ With his other hand, he made the correct sign, and all thirty of the bombs detonated simultaneously. The area in a forty-meter radius of him was blasted with light and heat, forcing him to close his eyes and flinch defensively. When he opened them again, his jaw dropped- He stood in the center of a huge crater, on a single spot of untouched grass. For forty meters in any direction, the dirt had been blown away to form a deep pit, and what was left was charred black and smoking. _Genji, no…_

Kame's brief moment of panic subsided when he saw his fellow Sand genin laid out on the ground just outside the blast crater, seemingly singed but still visibly breathing. The proctor performed the routine checks and then shouted, "Winner by knockout: Kame Hakiara!"

The crowd went wild, apparently loving the mass destruction he'd caused. Genji groaned and stirred a little bit, and Kame walked over to help him up. "That was a good fight, man."

Genji looked at the blast crater and paled. "Oh holy… that's… yeah, good fight." He stood up, and the crowd's cheers got even louder- _maybe they aren't just for me,_ thought Kame. He turned to walk off towards the staircase that led up to the viewing balcony, while Genji moved in the opposite direction towards the exit. Somehow, over the wild cheering and everything else, Kame heard Haku's voice.

"You're amazing, Kame!" She was smiling at him, and he couldn't help but smile back- until he saw another form standing at the bottom of the stairs. Naruko was looking at him with naked distaste, arms folded over her chest. When he wordlessly passed by her, he felt a surge of what his academy instructors had called _killing intent_ \- something that he'd only felt directed at him once before, from Sankrow.

When he reached the top of the stairs, Keikiro was just starting down. Kame instinctively stopped and looked into her eyes. "Please be careful, Keikiro."

She smiled and nodded. "Yeah, yeah, I'll keep myself safe. You sound like my mom." He couldn't do any more and helplessly watched her descend, sickening feeling in his stomach growing by the second. He walked up to the balcony, bracing himself for a comment from Miriki, but nothing came. The usually-snarky boy had nothing to say, looking more worried than Kame had ever seen him. Kame wished he had the Hatogan, or at least Miriki's skill with people, so that he could return his teammate's favors and reassure him. But he didn't, so instead he ducked out and turned to watch the next fight, unable to curb even his own terror.

The blast crater had been fixed by the proctor's jutsu, so it was on pristine ground that the two kunoichi approached each other. The crowd grew silent as the proctor stood between them, arm raised, and then… "Ready? Go!"

The instant the match began, it was over. Keikiro dashed backwards, but Naruko flashed through a set of handsigns and shouted, "Wind Style: Inescapable Grasp!" The Valley genin, while still in midair, was blown back towards the Uchiha girl and was met with the hilt of a kunai to the forehead. Clearly dazed, Keikiro shakily regained her feet, which Naruko _allowed_ for some reason, backing off for the moment.

Then came the next attack. "Fire Style: Phoenix Fire Jutsu!" Several smaller fireballs blasted into the ground around Keikiro, just far away enough to avoid seriously burning her but still sending roiling heat over her and causing her to cry out and fall backwards. However, as she struggled back, she visibly met Naruko's eyes and stopped making any noise whatsoever. The Leaf kunoichi proceeded to unleash another barrage of fireballs, this time singeing her opponent- but not eliciting any cries of pain or protest.

Keikiro stood up shakily, standing there, as Naruko threw a quick flurry of shuriken, clipping her just enough to draw blood with each one, and Kame realized what was going on. _She's looking to demolish Keikiro, not just beat her. She wants to humiliate, harm, and push her to the brink- but while she's in that genjutsu, Keikiro can't surrender._ Miriki appeared to have reached the same conclusion, eyes blazing with rage as he could only watch Keikiro's brutal loss.

Naruko shouted, "Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu!" and a huge flame sprang forth from her hands, impacting the ground just in front of Keikiro and knocking her backwards and off of her feet, burning off some of her clothing and singeing her skin. _I have to… I…_ Kame couldn't do anything without getting disqualified himself, maybe even knocking out his two teammates in the process. _But I can't just watch this._ He prepared himself to jump the railing, but Miriki put a hand on his chest and held him back.

The other boy's eyes were in their hatogan state- but more than that, now they had four points in them, the star becoming cross-shaped. Staring intently at Keikiro, he whispered, "Hatogan Secret Art: Mind Execution." Keikiro instantly collapsed like a puppet with its strings cut, flopping to the ground and lying there. Miriki let out a long, tortured breath and shook his head. "I'm sorry."

As medical ninja hurried out onto the field and loaded the incapacitated Keikiro onto a stretcher. Naruko made a disgusted noise and stalked off towards the viewer's balcony, meeting Kame's furious eyes with a glare of her own. _I get to fight her in the next round_ , he thought, trying his damndest to remember all the hatred he was feeling. _Then I can see justice done._


	17. Arc 2 Vol 7: The Strength of Hard Work

**Ninja Profile: Kakuzen Uzumaki**

Ninjutsu: A  
Genjutsu: B  
Taijutsu: C  
Specialties: Byakugan, Wood Release, Chakra Stores

Description: Kakuzen Uzumaki inherited the dark hair, blue eyes, and whisker birthmarks of his mother. He stands at a normal height and build, usually wearing sweatpants or whatever casual clothing he wants to, with one notable feature: A loose white coat, in the style of his idol (Minato Namikaze). He is reserved and quiet, but makes judgements about others that are very difficult to change.

Origin: Kakuzen is the child of Himawari Uzumaki and Tenrou Senju. As a multiple-bloodline-heir, he grew up about equal in respect to his eventual teammate Naruko, ans as a result he set his sights high: to become Hokage, the same dream as his grandfather and great-grandfather. He began to model most things in his life after the ways of Minato Namikaze, and his greatest goal is to surpass the legendary 'flee on sight' Yellow Flash of the Hidden Leaf.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

There was a brief break between the rounds, ten minutes for the participants to strategize and the spectators to gather themselves. Kame spent it talking to Haku and Miriki, trying his best not to glance at Naruko. Miriki's moment of weakness was over, and now he was grinning at his teammates gleefully. "I just got stage four, guys!"

Kame nodded. "Okay, and stage four is…?"

Miriki sighed. "One of two tiers that unlocks super powerful dojutsu."

"And why did you just randomly develop this power? How did you know how to cast the dojutsu? Why did you hit Keikiro with it instead of Naruko? Why-" Kame was confused by the complexity of the Kosuki kekkegenkai and the flurry of questions left his mouth one after the other. Haku, on the other hand, walked away from the two of them towards the other genin for some reason.

Miriki held up a hand. "Slow down there, dude. I'll answer them one at a time, okay? The hatogan unlocks when you feel extreme, real emotional pain because of someone else that you care about. You can't use it at all until you've unlocked at least three stages, though..." _That sounds similar to the sharingan,_ Kame thought.

"So who-"

Miriki winced and put a finger over Kame's mouth, then looked to both sides suspiciously before answering. "Keikiro, just now. My parents were the other two, and Haku was the most recent before Keikiro today." _Haku? Did he know her, before the team? No, at the first meeting he said that he hadn't unlocked the kekkegenkai yet. Could he know about Haku trying to kill herself… but I didn't tell anyone, how could he…?_

Kame realized his mistake when Miriki sighed and replied to his unvoiced fears. "Yes, I knew. My family… well, they know everything that goes on in the village. My parents said… they said that they'd posted someone to follow her and scan her thoughts, and that she'd killed herself. Their exact words were, 'Now you can give up your silly little ninja games and-'" Miriki stopped, realizing he'd said too much, and put back on his smile.

"Well, I got my hatogan there, and imagine my surprise when Haku came to our next team meeting. I didn't know what happened, if my parents lied, but when you two came back I saw it all in your fears."

"And what about my other questions? How did you know how to use the kekkegenkai?"

"Well, we're taught how to use it before we even get it in most cases. The Kosuki clan expects much from their heir- or, they did, before I convinced them otherwise. As for why I hit Keikiro, well, the Mind Execution Jutsu is a finisher that only works on people whose minds are _already_ under attack by genjutsu. It completely shuts down their mind for a while, but takes up a lot of chakra- I couldn't use it on Naruko, since she wasn't under any genjutsu."

Kame felt a strange moment of kinship with Miriki that he'd never have imagined would come to pass. "Huh. You act like a screwoff, but deep down you're a good person, aren't you?"

"Yeah, just shout it for the whole world to hear, why don't-" Miriki clammed up when Haku approached them. "Hey, Haku! I was just explaining to Kame here how he shouldn't be embarrassed about his habit of wearing girl's underwear."

Haku looked confused, and Kame immediately forgot any respect he'd had for Miriki in the last few minutes. "No! I don't… what are you…"

Sureki approached them behind Haku and gave them a little wave. He turned to Kame, face downcast. "Look, I know that I shouldn't say this, but… I think it's best if you guys just forfeit to Naruko."

Kame immediately shook his head. "No."

"Look, it's… she's not…" the Hyuga boy sighed and dropped his gaze in shame. "I don't want you to misconstrue this as me trying to help her win, or me trying to 'save' her from being upset. That's not what this is." _Then what the hell-_ "Naruko… she's been through a lot growing up, and her biggest driving factor is her desire to make good on the legacy of all the clans coming to a head in her. She has the blood of the Uchiha, the Uzumaki, the Namikaze, and the Hyuga in her veins, so for her to lose is-"

"What about for her to hurt people?" Kame challenged. "What about for her to kill other peoples' dreams? You can talk about her lineage all you want, but when you look at her _actions_ she's an unstable bully!"

Sureki responded with more anger than Kame would have thought. "You don't know her! You don't understand what…" he trailed off. "In preparation for the final tournament, our sensei had us look at village data on the other participants. I know you come from the shattered remnants of a clan from the Heat Devil Village, so please don't presume to know what it's like to have the expectations of a vast group of people all weighing on your success.

"As for your teammates- Haku," he said, turning to face her, "There was nothing at all on you, so… I don't know what that means, my best guess is that nobody bothered to collect information on the taijutsu-only-user." _That's very, very wrong,_ thought Kame, but he held his tongue. "And Miriki, you're from the Kosuki, and however small and insignificant-" _What!?_ "-they might be, they're still a clan. Don't you understand the constant pressure of expectations and traditions?"

Miriki chuckled a little bit. "Yeah, I did, but after a lot of hard work I've convinced them to give up on me… mostly. They still send my _perfect_ cousin, Ginsenbo, to come after me and…" he cleared his throat, then continued in a fake aristocratic voice: "Rectify my unseemly and improper behavior."

Sureki looked taken aback. "You aren't even trying to make your clan proud?"

"No, I'm doing the opposite."

Before the Hyuga boy could press the topic any more, the proctor's voice sounded out across the arena. "Everyone, return to your seats, the quarterfinals will begin very shortly! The first match will be between Haku of the Hidden Sand, who defeated the self-proclaimed 'prodigy of the Hidden Cloud' using taijutsu alone in an epic turnaround victory, and Tetsute Hasagi, also of the Hidden Sand, who covered the whole arena with hellfire to defeat another invincible Cloud ninja!" _So now that we made it to the quarterfinals, we get flashy intros, huh?_

Sureki groaned. "Kenken-sensei, you're too much." _Oh. Is that just a personal thing?_ The Hyuga turned to him and explained: "Kenken-sensei made a public bet with the Hokage about how many of you Sand ninja would move on. He won; so he's allowed to do whatever he wants with the rest of this stage of the exam." _Yep, definitely a personal thing._

Kame turned to Haku and held out his hand for a fist-bump. "You can do this, Haku."

She returned the fist-bump, smiled, and walked off. Tetsute stepped forward from his spot alone in the corner, moving towards the stairs, but Kame approached him. "Tetsute, don't…"

He turned, eyes angry. "What? Don't win?"

"No." That wasn't what Kame was afraid of. "Don't…" _How can I put this into words?_ "Don't go easy- no, that's not right. Don't make a sham out of this fight." _That's better._ "Haku worked just as hard, if not harder, than all of us to get this far, and if you devalue her accomplishment by-"

Tetsute brushed past him. "I don't have to listen to anything you say. And if you expect me to go _easy_ on her, well… weren't you the one who was accusing me of being too hard on her just a week ago?" He disappeared down the steps, leaving Kame to hope that the fight between Haku and the one who'd ruined her life didn't fall apart. _That's right… he actually ruined her life, right from the moment where the village first cast her out up to the night where she tried to kill herself._ If Tetsute did win this fight and make it to the finals, then that was one more reason for Kame to win against Naruko and move forward in the tournament.

Shakily, Kame approached the balcony and watched as Haku and Tetsute made their way to the center of the field. Kenken was dancing around like an idiot, moving between strange stances like a referee for a game that was in his imagination. Haku reached her spot and stood there, looking better than she had earlier (but not completely fine). The time between the fights seemed to have been enough to almost completely replenish her energy, but her scrapes and bruises remained, as did the scuffs on her black leg warmers and clothing. Still, she wore an expression of intense focus, dropping into her taijutsu stance.

Tetsute also looked less exhausted than at the end of his last battle, but unlike Haku he still stooped a little bit from exhaustion and moved slower than normal. His face, though, wasn't set like hers was, instead twisted in some sort of indecision, and Kame thought he knew why. _If he fights her all-out, then he recognizes that (in his twisted ideology) she is strong and deserves to be fought like a fellow shinobi. He'd have to admit that he was wrong to bully her; but on the other hand, the same thing happens if he loses._ To be completely honest, Kame took a lot of satisfaction out of watching the other boy have to face the living embodiment of his faulty ideology.

Finally, Kenken sumo-stomped between the two of them, lifted his arms above his head, and then swung them down, shouting, "Let the game begin!" He leaped off to the side as Haku and Tetsute both started moving, circling one another but maintaining a good distance. Due to Tetsute's inner conflict, he wouldn't make the first move, but as a taijutsu specialist Haku couldn't afford to run forward at a readied opponent- _If she gets caught, she's completely done for._

The silence was broken by Haku, who spoke softly enough that Kame had to strain to hear it, and he doubted that the observers in the stand would be able understand it at all. "Tetsute… why?"

Tetsute replied in the same tone of voice, and despite the vague question he seemed to know exactly what she was talking about. "Because… you were weak. You were always weak, and I knew that if people like you overstepped where they belonged, they'd…" he trailed off.

Across the circle from him, Haku shook her head. "You say that, but here I am in the quarterfinals of the chunin exams. I won against someone who, by your definitions, would be one of the strongest of all."

"It was a fluke!" Tetsute's voice, while still quiet, had taken on the tone of a child who knew they were losing the argument but wouldn't admit defeat.

"Tetsute, I… I succeeded in an A-rank mission. I passed both other stages of the chunin exams. Are those all flukes as well?" Haku was far calmer than Kame could have kept himself.

Tetsute set his mouth in a hard line, seemingly gathering himself before he replied. "When ninja who don't deserve their rank step into situations they aren't qualified for, everyone pays the price." Beside Kame, Miriki gasped and stepped back, hatogan-enhanced eyes widened in realization.

Haku suddenly broke the soft conversation with a sudden rush towards Tetsute, swinging forward a fist towards his face. He shouted, "Substitution!" and replaced himself with a rock, but Haku never finished her strike. Tetsute turned around to see the rock plunk to the ground unharmed while Haku had already hopped a few meters back. For the first time, the Hasagi boy's face shifted with real anger at being faked out and his hands twitched towards his chest-

But before he made any handsigns, he grunted and returned to a neutral position. Kame could see his thought process through his expression- _If he attacks her with jutsu, then he's admitting that she's not only strong enough to fight him; she's strong enough to fight him without using any of her own jutsu. This battle isn't about win or lose, not for these two, it's about Haku seeking acknowledgement from him and his refusal to give it._

Haku approached him cautiously, maintaining her ready stance, but Tetsute simply avoided her with defensive tactics and occasional escape jutsu. Miriki grabbed Kame by the arm and stole his attention off of the fight, his voice insistent. "You were friends with Tetsute, right?" Kame was hesitant to nod, but the other boy continued anyway. "Did you ever meet his parents? Did he ever talk about them?"

Kame shook his head. "No, I never… it was always a touchy subject, because he wanted to be a ninja despite them being ramen cooks…" _That's not the full story, is it?_

Miriki looked strangely bitter as he glanced at their estranged classmate. "He's not… I… I know why…" he swallowed, visibly trying to gather himself, before finishing his statement. "His dad wasn't originally a ramen chef. He was a ninja, not a very good one, but he graduated the academy and scraped by as a low-ranking genin. Eventually, his more skilled squadmates got good enough to earn them some C-rank missions, but…" Miriki's expression changed to… pity? "They ended up on a B-rank mission, and he got pinned down. The other ninja in his squad sacrificed themselves, as well as the mission, in order to save him, but he quit afterwards. It was a huge failure for the village, and he never fully recovered."

Kame lost his voice briefly, so full of mixed emotions that his throat simply refused to formulate words. _Tetsute hid that from me all this time? That's why he doesn't want Haku to… but no. She's not his father and a mission gone wrong is a staple of ninja life._ Kame looked back towards the field with a far more confused spirit.

Haku couldn't know all of this, but… _I guess it's my turn to play psychologist,_ thought Kame. He turned to face Miriki: "Don't tell her about this."

"But-"

"Just don't." Kame looked at the ground. "I'm sure you already understand all of this, but… Haku takes everything onto herself. She took the bullying to mean that she deserved to be bullied; she took the rejection of our village as a sign that she was a reject. If you tell her about this, it'll take away any self-respect she's built up. Tetsute will become someone who was morally right in what he did to her, and she won't be able to move on from it all." Miriki bit his lip but nodded in agreement, turning with Kame back to watch the fight.

Very little had changed, as Tetsute was still moving only evasively and the crowd was actually starting to boo the two of them. Haku looked up at the gathered people and seemed to tighten up, refocusing her attention back to Tetsute with far more purpose. "Tetsute, after all of the hatred, all of the obstacles you put in my path…" She dashed forward and slammed an open palm into his chest, forcing him to stagger back a few steps. "Now you're going to do this?"

She looked him in the eyes, and he winced a little bit. "You said that without jutsu, I could never be a ninja. That I was worthless, and should just… stop. But what the hell are _you_ doing now? If you're just going to sit here and be pummeled without using any jutsu in defense, then what makes you strong and me weak?" Tetsute's eyes narrowed into a glare, and something inside him snapped. He assumed his own stance, whatever that had been holding him back no longer doing so.

"Fine, you asked for it." He slammed his hands together and flashed through a new set of handsigns, and then sank into the ground. "Earth Style: Sandshark Jutsu!" His head disappeared into the earth, leaving a small sunken area that surged forward towards Haku. She dodged backwards, so when he emerged in a shower of earth his attack failed to hit her. "Earth Style: Earth Clone Jutsu." Two more Tetsutes appeared at positions in a rough triangle around Haku. "Earth Style Combination: Feeding Frenzy Jutsu!" Both of the clones sank into the ground like he had and moved forwards rapidly to attack her.

Haku dodged the first two, but the third attack hit her. When Tetsute emerged, two jaw-like forms made of earth emerged in front of him and snapped shut on Haku, holding her in place with her arms at her sides. _He's a lot stronger than I gave him credit for,_ Kame realized. _He knows so many earth release jutsu- while I was mastering paperbombs and reading about ninja, he was mastering his own style of underground fighting…_

"Now you're mine." Tetsute moved backwards until there was a good twenty meters of distance between them, then ran through another set of handsigns. "This is my strongest jutsu, Haku- maybe this will finally get the idea across that you _can't beat me_ with your pathetic martial arts." Haku, despite it all, grinned widely. _She won the moral battle, didn't she? Tetsute fought her as an equal._ "Earth Style: Mountain Tsunami!"

The mound rolled forward, growing faster and faster and assuming the shape of a wave. By the time it neared Haku, it was already ten meters high and ten meters wide, moving faster than a ninja could run. _This might be it…_ Kame leaned forward in anxiousness, desperate to see the outcome. However, as the wave of earth reached Haku and hit her, concealing her almost entirely beneath its bulk, it… stopped. For a few heartbeats, the arena was still and silent- then a muffled voice came from the earthen prison: "Seven Heavens, First Activation: Breath of Restraint!" Haku burst through the top of it, faintly glowing and showering the area around her with rock.

Kame's eyes widened in surprise. _What is that? Some sort of taijutsu technique, or...? She's stronger and faster now._ Haku stood there, seemingly almost vibrating with power, and then blurred in a streak of purple to stand behind Tetsute. _What!?_ She slammed a fist forward and Tetsute's chest exploded into dirt, the rest of him crumbling into a pile of earth. "You fell for an Earth Clone." The real Tetsute was gloating as he rose from the earth. "Earth Style: Landshark Jutsu!" The jaws of earth rose up and snapped shut around Haku, who seemingly struggled ineffectively.

"Without ninjutsu or genjutsu, you aren't capable of the tactical maneuvers that a ninja needs- all you can do is run and hit things." Tetsute strode up, lifting a kunai towards her neck. "Now the match is over." He stood beside her and held the knife to her throat, and the proctor nodded.

"Winner by-"

"Second Activation: Breath of Strength!" _Is this like the eight inner gates? A temporary power-up with a cost?_ The earthen prison exploded and Tetsute was flung away from Haku, who was now actually glowing with power, her eyes turned white and her body grown in size slightly. "You didn't think I could hold my own as a ninja, but Kame believed in me. I won't let him down!" She rushed forward, tearing up the ground under her feet.

"Earth Style: Wall of Earth!" Tetsute threw up a huge wall of dirt. _He's trying to slow her down by forcing her to go around the wall,_ Kame considered. _Then he can go back underground to rethink his strategy._ "Earth Style: Hiding Mole Ju-"

He was cut off when Haku went directly _through_ the two feet of solid earth without even slowing down and soccer-kicked him in the chest hard enough to rip him from the ground and send him flying off towards the wall of the arena. While he was in the air, though, she went even faster than he was and streaked up to be beside him. "Hidden Devil!"

She struck him down with a kick but somehow stayed with him for the fifteen meter drop, a barrage of punches and kicks keeping him off-balance and sending him flying downwards ever faster. Her final strike pounded him into the ground, cracking the dirt and clearly knocking him out if he hadn't been already. Haku, for her part, straightened up slowly and spoke once more to him. "You told me that I could never hold my own as a ninja, that it took power that I couldn't achieve. Kame taught me that I could do it, that I was strong enough, and that I deserved to be the shinobi I wanted to be."

"Winner in a nail-biting knockout using her extreme taijutsu and insane anti-jutsu skills: Haku!" Kenken stepped forward and yanked Haku's arm up into the air to the wild cheering of the crowd, and she smiled wider than ever. Even as she made her way back to the genin's viewing area, the happiness never left her face. _She overcame Tetsute,_ Kame thought. _This doesn't fix anything that happened to her, but it does put it all behind her._ As she ascended to their level and high-fived Kame, he hoped that internally she'd regained the self-confidence lost through her childhood.

"And now, the next match! That's right, folks, this next fight is between the Gentle Fist prodigy of our own Hidden Leaf, Sureki Hyuga, and the boy who uses the very same technique as the first Hokage, Kakuzen Uzumaki!" The crowd gave a scattered round of applause as the two team one members walked out onto the field and assumed their stances. Kame leaned forward a bit, as did Haku- the winner of this fight would be her opponent in the semifinals. _I hope Sureki wins this, and not just because it's a better matchup for Haku. He's a genuinely good person._

"Let's get ready to rumble! Who will win in this epic showdown of wood versus muscle?" Kenken threw a hand with three fingers extended into the air. "Three! Two! One! Go!" Vastly different from the slow, ramping battle that had just gone down, the two leaf genin immediately laid into each other with everything they had.

Kakuzen threw out a hand and three huge tendrils of wood pierced the earth behind him and shot forward towards Sureki. The smaller boy assumed the distinctive Gentle Fist stance and then shouted, "Eight Trigrams: Rotation!" He released a huge amount of chakra and spun rapidly, destroying the wooden tendrils as they came at him. When the rotation ended, he stood completely unharmed- but Kakuzen was standing halfway across the arena, already preparing another jutsu.

"Wood Style: Bark Fortress Jutsu!" Similar to Tetsute, he slammed his palm into the ground under his feet. The earth rumbled briefly, and then a wooden structure rose up and formed into a tower ten meters high, with thorny spikes on the flat walls. Kakuzen stood on a flat platform on top of it, eyes fully veined and paled. _He has wood release and byakugan… he might be even stronger than Naruko._

Sureki growled and ran through a set of his own handsigns. "Water Style: Water Clone Jutsu!" From the river behind him, three forms coalesced into exact copies of him, who charged forward towards Kakuzen's tower. The four Surekis fanned out until they surrounded it, one for each side of the square building, and then all attacked at once.

Before they even came close, Kakuzen released another jutsu. "Wood Style: Rootspike Jutsu!" Like during the second stage, the ground started releasing huge wooden spikes underneath the Sureki clones- but they dodged, very easily, and closed the distance to approach the tower. However, off-balance from the dodges, they were helpless to avoid it when the tower's small thorns extended to great lengths and impaled them all. The real Sureki managed to deflect it with a gentle fist strike, but now he was well in range of Kakuzen's attacks and still forced to dodge the rootspikes.

Kakuzen spoke to his teammate in a strangely friendly voice. "You should just concede, uncle." _Uncle!?_ "I don't want to hurt you any more than I have to, but I will if I absolutely must."

Sureki rolled to the side to avoid another rootspike, seemingly ignoring his teammate, and then assumed the Gentle Fist stance once again. "You're pretty cocky, nephew." _What? But they're the same age…_ "I guess having a stronger byakugan makes you pretty sure that you can beat me… but there are some things that you're taught, not born with." He emphasized the words with another dodge, and now he was well within range of the tower's spikes. "Eight Trigrams: Two Palms!" Two quick blows knocked aside spikes extending towards him, even as he marched closer to the fortress.

"Four Palms!" Another two spikes were blown out of the way as he increased in speed, now moving parallel to the wall of the structure. "Eight Palms!" He struck the _tower itself_ with the next four attacks, dodging around Kakuzen's spikes. "Sixteen Palms!" Eight more attacks hit all over the tower's side, and something strange was happening- _The spikes, they're slowing…_

"Thirty-Two Palms!" The barrage of attacks was almost unhindered as the rootspikes stopped coming and the tower ceased its defensive extensions. "Sixty-Four Palms!" Sureki's next thirty-two strikes were scattered all around the wooden fort, and he finally came to a stop directly before Kakuzen, standing on the earth far below his opponent. Kakuzen peered over the edge, annoyed expression on his face, but no attacks came. "Wood Style isn't very useful when you can't touch the ground, now is it? You were sending your signals through the tower itself, but even my weak byakugan can see the chakra points of something this big." _He blocked off Kakuzen's wood jutsu by destroying the living wood's chakra network!_ Kame failed to keep the amazed expression from his face at the display of martial skill.

Kakuzen narrowed his eyes, leaping backwards off of his fortress. "Well done, but it'll take more than- grk!" His statement was cut off by _Sureki_ grabbing him in midair from behind. The Sureki that had been speaking to him before dissolved into a pool of water. _Was it a clone the whole time? Or did he make and hide a clone, then substitute with it afterwards?_ Whichever it was, Kakuzen had fallen for it and was now stuck in midair with Sureki behind him.

A trail of bandages emerged from Sureki's arm, which swung out and wrapped around his opponent. "Frontal Lotus!" _So this is the jutsu that the Sand Devil is based off of,_ Kame thought. Kakuzen's eyes widened in horror as Sureki spun with him in midair, faster and faster, and the pair hurtled towards the ground. In an impact that made Kame wince, Kakuzen was drilled into the solid ground head-first, while Sureki hopped backwards, obviously taxed from the effort.

The proctor checked to make sure that Kakuzen was well and truly unconscious, then yelled (far too happily): "And we have a winner! In a blistering taijutsu combination move, Sureki Hyuga has defeated the undefeatable Wood Style and claimed his place in the semifinals!" Sureki exited the field grinning and Kame couldn't help but smile back- until he remembered his own situation. "Next up, in the final battle of the quarterfinals, we have the ninja who demolished half the arena in one attack, Kame Hakiara, versus the ninja with the blood of not only the Uchiha, but the Hyuga _and_ Uzumaki clans in her veins!"

Kame swallowed, trying but failing to mask his anxiety as he walked towards the starcase. _Remember the hatred... what a joke_ , he thought morbidly. _I'm not an avenger. I don't have any kekkegenkai, and she has three of the most powerful. Why would-_ Someone tapped him on the shoulder, and he whirled around to see Haku grinning at him. "Good luck, Kame." In that moment, he realized why he had to win- _If I lose, Miriki loses, and Haku wins, then she's up against Naruko. I will not put her in that fight._


	18. Arc 2 Vol 8: Quarterfinals' Conclusion

**(A/N) I take it back, _Ft._ is the best song ever. I was actually having trouble writing these tournament arc fight scenes until I put that on.**

 **Ninja Profile: Naruko Uchiha**

Ninjutsu: A  
Genjutsu: A  
Taijutsu: C  
Specialties: Sharingan, Byakugan, Dojutsu

Description: Naruko stands at average height, with long black hair and dark eyes. She is usually sneering or smirking, only dropping her attitude when those she respects are around her- but there are precious few who earn that honor. She usually wears red kunoichi clothing with black underneath, forgoing the standard Leaf genin vest.

Origin: Naruko is the sole child of Sarada Uchiha and Boruto Uzumaki, and grew up highly honored among almost everyone in the Leaf. As a melding of the two ancient clans of the Leaf, she was almost a prodigal child, and performed as such. However, when her mother died in an S-class bodyguard mission that turned out to be a trap, Naruko blamed the kindness that she saw corrupting the Hidden Leaf. People who were kind to her only reaffirmed her rapidly growing belief that the Leaf was growing soft and that eventually this path would destroy them, so she pushed herself as hard as possible to become strong enough not only to protect the Leaf, but to change it back to the ways of the past.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Naruko's killing intent washed over him, inexorable and almost suffocating in its intensity. _Why does she hate me like this?_ Kame thought, but the answer didn't really make a difference. She was there, and he had to beat her- to protect Haku and avenge his friends. He dimly registered Kenken's theatrics, but most of his attention was commanded by the girl in front of him- in her eyes, which were already in their sharingan state. "Three! Two! One!" _Shit, have to look away before the round starts and she can hit me with the genjutsu!_ "Go!"

Kame retreated slowly, ever-careful to watch for her attacks while also avoiding her eyes. Meanwhile, he ordered Wasp to circle around through the treeline. _I was incredibly stupid to think I'd be able to handle Crow,_ Kame admitted to himself. _This is mentally taxing enough with a training puppet._

Naruko didn't move from her starting position, keeping track of the moving puppet with quick glances. Once it moved far enough behind her, she put her fingers into the cross-sign: "Shadow Clone Jutsu!" Four shadow clones appeared around her, two of them moving back towards Wasp and two of them moving forward at Kame. _Okay, Shadow clones take a lot of chakra, but have no elemental weaknesses… They still break more easily than a real human, though._

He ordered Wasp to rise into the air and send off a quick barrage of needles towards the clones, while tossing forward a Firebomb airplane and detonating it between the two clones assigned to him. He heard two pops, but the two clones coming at him had dodged the explosion and the napalm. _Okay, so now there's an ignited section of the field, have to keep that in mind._

He turned Wasp towards Naruko and fired off two needles- but not at her. The shots flew true and went straight towards the two clones still approaching him, who turned around to block the attacks. With their backs to him, it was easy for him to unleash two shuriken to put them out of commission. _I think I'm winning in the chakra department, then. Four clones that are already jonin-level to make should cost her more than moving Wasp around cost me. Time for me to go on the offensive, then._

Kame threw a Windbomb to the ground at his feet and, still keeping an eye on Naruto's body, took out a kunai, wrapping a weakened bomb around the hilt. Naruko turned quickly, and he had to turn his attention to what she was doing: _Making handsigns, I think that's-_ "Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu!" Unable to look at her face but still seeing the glow of flames starting, Kame ducked backwards, but quickly realized his error- _That's not coming at me, it's coming at Wasp._ He yanked the puppet downwards, and it narrowly evaded the cone of fire.

 _Okay, now-_ "Shadow Clone Jutsu!" Three more Narukos ran forward towards Kame, and he had to use a weakened bomb- _Wait, no, there's still one on the kunai._ He grabbed the kunai and threw it at the charging enemies, making the sign to detonate it and taking out two of them. "Fireball Jutsu!" He instinctively yanked Wasp backwards, but this one was coming at _him_ instead. Without enough time to truly dodge it, the flames clipped his leg and sent searing pain running through it. _I'm not all the way back from my fight with Genji._

"Fire Style: Phoenix Flame Jutsu!" _Shit, another one!?_ Kame looked up and saw the flaming projectiles already far too close, and had only one real option left. He made the sign to detonate the Windbomb he'd dropped at his feet- and nothing happened. _What!?_ He looked down and saw that it had been reduced to smoldering tatters by the fireball he'd dodged earlier. _This is bad, I'm slipping-_

The first of the fireballs caught his uninjured leg, sending a spiderweb of pain shooting up his nerves. Despite the horror of being burned, he had to swallow his reactions and managed to dodge the next three fireballs. For the first time since the fight had started, Kame had a moment to think. _She's chaining her attacks and abusing the fact that I can't meet her eyes, not giving me any time to formulate any plans of my own. If this keeps up, she'll chip me down bit by bit…_

Kame looked back up towards Naruko's chest. _Playing for time is my only real option here, so…_ "Hey, Naruko! Tell me something: Why are you so hateful towards people from villages that you've never even been to?"

She snorted, and although he couldn't see her expression he could tell from her tone of voice that she was disgusted. "Are you complaining about being beaten? Is this what the ninja world is, now? A game, where people hold your hand and everyone's nice all the time?"

"The ninja world was never a place where genin tortured other genin for no reason."

"I won every single round up to here." She was more bitter than aggressive now. "I beat you _and_ those Valley losers in the opening test, I put that purple-haired girl out of commission with one attack. You're a ninja, in a fight with another ninja from a rival village, so drop the goody-two-shoes act and _fight me_!" The last two words were accompanied by a shuriken that Kame deflected using his kunai.

 _She's not wrong,_ he thought helplessly. _Am I just a weakling who isn't cut out for the ninja world? Did I paint some fake image of the shinobi world as a place where friendship and honor are the most important things?_ Kame remembered all the stories of Naruto he'd read, the tales where his perseverance and kindness won over everyone to his side. _Is that just a pipe dream?_ "Your grandfather doesn't believe in that kind of shinobi world." He heard her breath hitch and knew he'd struck a nerve.

"My grandfather, the _honorable seventh Hokage_ , is…" _She's struggling to say something._ Her voice hitched and Kame had a sneaking suspicion that her face was pained. "The real world, the ninja world, isn't…" Naruko trailed off again, this time glancing up towards where the Kage were sitting. _She won't say it in front of Naruto._

Kame did his best to surreptitiously drop another Windbomb on the ground just behind him, but it was far too much to expect to get away with. Naruko's all-seeing sharingan must have picked up on it, because she dropped into a ready stance and lost the indecision in her voice. "But it doesn't matter. What matters is me passing this test, and you're standing in my path."

 _Alright, back to the fighting. I can't afford to mentally fall apart again._ Kame pulled out three shuriken and flung it at her, simultaneously twitching the finger to send off one of Wasp's legs to Naruko's left. He'd led the shuriken slightly to the right, so she was open to dodge to the left fairly easily… but she saw through his attack and jumped straight up into the air. _She can't turn or dodge in midair, so…_ he fired a second leg towards her. _Did I get her? This easily?_

He caught the faintest glimpse of a cocky grin on her face, and then she shouted, "Wind Style: Wind Cushion Jutsu!" _What? I made that one up yesterday, how… the sharingan can already replicate it?_ She was launched off to the side by the small gust of wind, and landed expertly before using another shadow clone jutsu for four more of herself. _Back to square one._

Still, she couldn't keep this up forever. Her chakra had to be running low at this point, while Kame was still in great shape. He tossed a few shuriken at the two clones that were charging him, lifting Wasp a bit higher to avoid its two clones' attacks. The clones coming at him deflected the hastily thrown shuriken and just kept coming, forcing him to use another weakened bomb airplane against them, as well as two more shuriken. They had to focus on the shuriken, allowing the plane to sail between them and destroy both of them.

 _Wait…_ Kame thought of a plan and threw together two more weakened bomb airplanes, launching them towards the real Naruko _almost_ simultaneously. She looked forward at the approaching plane and threw a single shuriken at it. _Yes…_ His version of the Shadow Shuriken Jutsu had worked, and the second one was too close for her to dodge it. A quick handsign detonated the bomb mere feet away from her, and-

She disappeared in a puff of smoke. _What!? When did she…_ One of the clones attacking Wasp finished making the necessary signs. "Wind Style: Inescapable Grasp!" Wasp was yanked towards her, and she swung towards it. _Shit!_

Kame rapidly threw together his own jutsu, shouting, "Wind Style: Wind Barrier!" At the last second, a whirling cloud of air appeared around Wasp, throwing off her strike just enough to keep it in one piece- but Kame's hastily thrown together jutsu was unstable and sputtered out almost immediately afterwards. _Okay, now I have to get Wasp out of there. If I try to fly it out normally, she'll almost definitely knock it out of the sky…_

He knew what he had to do. He targeted Wasp, and- "Substitution Jutsu!" Now _he_ was the one mere feet away from the angry kunoichi. Immediately upon arrival, he saw her hands start to make a tiger seal and realized how much danger he was in. However, doing his best to remain calm, he locked eyes onto a rock near the river and… "Substitution!" _Okay, now me and Wasp are both out of-_ turning around, he saw the Naruko had turned and finished her jutsu, still aimed at him.

"Fire Style: Phoenix Flame Jutsu!" The barrage of fireballs streaked across the battlefield towards Kame, and he had mere seconds to get out of the way. Acting on some sort of instinct, he _retargeted_ the rock, still in midair, and repeated the jutsu he'd already used twice in the last few seconds.

"Substitution!" Back next to Naruko, he forced himself to avoid looking into her eyes and dropped a weakened bomb, then gathered his (rapidly depleting) chakra and pushed it out of his feet. "Wind Style: Wind Cushion Jutsu!" He was flung forward by his protesting, still-burned legs, pushing himself _too_ hard this time but still managing to make the correct detonation handsign before crashing into the ground. There was an explosion from behind him and a scream, and then he crashed face-first into the dirt.

Kame struggled back onto his feet, turning around slowly to view his handiwork. There was a small blast crater, and Naruko was flattened to the ground, back smoking and vest completely shredded. Kenken stepped forward, but before he could reach her to take her pulse she growled and moved her arms to her sides, lifting herself up to a kneeling position. At the last second, Kame remembered not to look at her face, but from what he'd seen she was beyond furious.

 _This is bad,_ Kame thought. _I'm down to three weakened bombs and five Windbombs, and my chakra's at about twenty percent. Still… I've pushed her further than anyone else has so far. Come on Kame, finish what you started._ He gritted his teeth and lifted Wasp from the ground where it had crashed, then willed it to fly towards him while he retreated into the trees. _She can't see me in here, so I should have a small period of relative safety._

However, as Wasp returned to arm's reach and he leaped into the branches, Naruko was still sitting on her knees. _Did I make her so upset- no, that's just wishful thinking. She's probably thinking through how she's gonna end this match, which means that I have to do a better job planning than her._ He looked over at Wasp, which was hovering beside him, and once again a stupid plan occurred to him.

 _No, come on, I can't do that… but, what else…?_ Finally, his mental wrestling ended as he grabbed Wasp and the weakened bombs in his pocket, then plastered the three remaining ones onto it. _Master Kankuro, please don't hate me._ Kame moved as stealthily as he could to the left, hopping from tree to tree until he was behind the kneeling Naruko. _Is she still sitting there? Is she chakra exhausted from all those shadow clones?_

Kame dropped Wasp to a lower height and then tossed two kunai at Naruko, who made no move to dodge. _Wait, those might kill her if she-_ he leaned forward in horror, but that proved to be a mistake as the kunai passed harmlessly through the illusory genjutsu. _Oh, crap._ He leaped from the tree, yanking Wasp with him, and rolled to a stop on the ground just before the spot where he'd been sitting went up in flames. A quick glance around revealed that the real Naruko was emerging from the forested section across the field from him.

He stumbled to his feet and charged at her, trying to ignore the pain in both legs from his earlier burns. Naruko made a noise of confusion as he closed the distance, readying his chakra in one of his hands held behind him. Finally he saw her hands come to her chest and make a series of signs, finally hearing her say: "Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu."

 _This is it,_ he thought while diving forward and swinging his arm around in front of him.. "Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu!" The resulting blast of wind thrust his diagonal body forwards and upwards, flying right over Naruko. While in the air, he saw Naruko apparently drop her jutsu and turn slowly to track his movement. With his chakra almost completely gone, Kame forced himself to use up even more. "Wind Style: Wind Cushion Jutsu!" He managed to unleash enough wind to push him backward in midair, so that while Naruko turned to meet him he went back the way he came and crashed to the ground behind her back.

 _Shit, I'm pretty much out of chakra,_ Kame thought. _But… no. I won't let it end like this._ Through force of will, he reached out and targeted something he was already linked to. Using up the last vestiges of chakra he had left, he shouted, "Substitution Jutsu!" Then he was on the ground beside a tree, and Wasp was in the air where he'd been. With shaking hands, he made the detonation handsign, and Naruko disappeared in an explosion of three weakened paperbombs.

 _I think… I did it._ Kame collapsed onto the ground, leaning back against the tree and allowing a faint smile to creep onto his face. _I won._ That thought was still fresh in his mind as Naruko emerged from behind a tree, walked up to him, and then ran through the signs that he now knew to represent the fireball jutsu. _What!? Was the one I just killed… a clone? But… I used up everything… I hit her with all that I could._ In his state, completely used up and watching Naruko finish setting up her jutsu, after using every trick and attack he could think of to no effect, he gave in. "I forfeit."

She didn't even stop, running through the rest of her signs and raising her hands to her mouth- but before she could finish it, Proctor Kenken was standing between them. "Winner by forfeit: Naruko Uchiha!" Still in a daze, Kame struggled to his feet, seeing Naruko glare at him as he limped off towards the losers' exit. He briefly considered turning around, but immediately decided against it. _I can't face Haku and Miriki right now._

He walked down the long hallway, but it didn't lead out of the arena as he'd hoped. Instead he found himself walking up a set of stairs that opened back out into the arena. Standing there, he saw Miriki and Dako walking out onto the field. _I guess I might as well see which of these two pays the price for my failure, huh?_ "Hey, Kame! Over here!" Kame looked up to see Genji waving him over, pointing to an empty seat. He settled in next to his fellow Sand genin, saying nothing, and Genji looked at him worriedly but didn't push the matter. _Good,_ Kame thought, _I need some time._ The two of them lapsed into silence and watched the match before them unfold.

Miriki was smiling, completely unharmed from his victory earlier and seemingly unperturbed by Kame's loss. Dako was like a polar opposite, huge and thick compared to Miriki's thin and graceful. His hair was light to Miriki's black, his skin dark to Miriki's pale, and even his stance was serious while Miriki's was casual. Kenken looked back and forth between them, then shouted: "And now, the final match of the quarterfinals, it's the silent giant of the Hidden Cloud village against the too-cool-for-school ladies' man of the Hidden Sand! On your marks… get set… go!"

Kame's teammate grinned and spoke in an off-handed way. "Hey, Dako. Let's be real here, you can't use _his_ power during the tournament without setting off all sorts of bells and whistles, right?"

The larger boy narrowed his eyes. "No." _What's that supposed to mean?_

"Annnd… Kosu and Zandeina. They both got knocked out." Dako took an angry step forward, but Miriki held up his hands in a pacifying gesture. "Hey, hey, don't get me wrong, I'm not making fun of them… but honestly, though, why are you fighting me here? I don't think they're going to promote you alone, and neither of them made very impressive showings, so…"

Dako narrowed his eyes but didn't attack. "What are you saying?"

Miriki shrugged, holding his hands out to the sides. "I mean… you don't really have very much to gain here. Even if you won this thing, both you and Zandeina aren't very cohesive people, so they won't promote you and then try to find another teammate for her, right?" Dako didn't respond. "Plus, they won't promote Kosu after that showing… your squad just isn't gonna get passed, dude."

Dako growled, making a few handsigns. "Water Style: Water Bullet!" A mass of water formed in front of him and then jetted towards Miriki, who neatly sidestepped it.

"Woah there, just calm-" Another bullet went flying towards him, and he had to duck under it. "-down, dude. I just-" A third bullet forced him to roll the the side. "-want to talk!"

Dako grimaced. "I don't like talking."

Miriki smirked. "Then just listen? So, I suggest you give up, because I'd rather not spend any more chakra fighting you and you have no reason to fight me." _What the hell? Is this seriously his angle?_ Kame was yanked out of his sullen self-disappointment by the familiar feeling of frustration towards Miriki. _You idiot, do you really think he's just going to surrender?_

"I do have a reason to fight." Dako entered a ready stance.

"Oh, I see, to impress Zandeina." Miriki smiled knowingly, but then had to dive to the ground as Dako sent another water bullet whizzing towards his head. "I saw her fight, man. Do you really think she's the type to fall for someone who surpasses her?" He climbed to his feet, dusting himself off. "Trust me, when it comes to the ladies I know exactly what they want." The entire arena was silent with disbelief. "And what that girl wants is to have a personal fan club. You know as well as I do that when Torino-sensei didn't acknowledge her strength she took it poorly, so what makes you think that you'll be any different?"

Dako froze. _Oh my god, is this actually working?_ Kame resolved to never doubt Miriki again if the Kosuki boy somehow managed to win without launching a single attack. However, the Cloud shinobi grunted and shook his head. "Nah, I don't think I'm gonna forfeit in front of the Raikage." He flashed through another set of handsigns and held out his hand. "Water Style: Depth Charge!"

The ground in front of him broke open in a miniature geyser, and then again a few feet forward, a string of mini-geysers popping up one after another, forming a line towards Miriki. "Oh, come on. Can't a guy have a nice, calm conversation without being attacked over and over?" _Miriki, why…_

He ran off towards the left, but the geysers kept after him. _So it's a tracking-type jutsu, huh? In that case, he needs to wait until the last second when it confirms his location, then dodge before it goes off._ Miriki did not do that, instead opting to keep mouthing off: "Anyway, for real dude, can you just call this thing off me?" _What the hell are you- he's your opponent, he's not going to just let you off for free!_

Dako furrowed his brow in confusion and opened his mouth to reply, but closed it and shook his head in exasperation instead. Miriki ran up the side of a tree and the jutsu following him imploded at the last point where he'd touched the ground, uprooting the trunk he was attached to. In a shriek of twisting wood, the tree fell over and crashed into the ground in a cloud of dust, leaves and splinters. _Well, I guess that's that. Dako is the one going up against Naruko, and-_

Miriki came jogging out from over by the river, unshakeable smirk still present on his face. "Okay, now that you've let out all that unnecessary aggression, can we get back to-"

"Water Style: Water Bullet Jutsu!" Dako fired off another attack, and Miriki dodged it like the others.

"That's just rude, man. What's your problem?"

"What's _my_ problem!?" Dako looked about as blown away by that statement as Kame was. _Miriki's trying to have a goddamn discussion in the middle of the chunin exams, and somehow Dako's the one who's in the wrong!?_

"Well, I'm glad you asked-"

"No."

"-because the issue here-"

"No!"

"-is that your attitude-"

"NO!" Dako yelled. "No more! You're the most annoying person I've ever met! Why the hell do you talk so much!?"

Miriki grinned. "Well, obviously, I'm playing for time."

Dako stepped back suspiciously. "Huh? Why-"

"Because I poisoned you with Highriver Serpent venom right as the match started, and now it's just a matter of time before your body stops working." Miriki's grin remained exactly the same despite the very different words coming from his mouth. "In fact, you should be feeling it right about now."

Dako flinched and raised a hand to his mouth, eyes crinkling in confusion. "What is- Grrkk!" He grunted in discomfort and then seemed to realize what was going on, making the basic chakra-focusing handsign. "G- Genjutsu Release!" _That's not going to do it,_ Kame thought, _you have to… nope._ When nothing happened, instead of retaining his disbelief in what was going on, Dako panicked and started breathing heavily.

"Yeah, the antidote is pretty simple, just some extract of etherweed- which I'm betting you don't have on you?" Miriki put his hands on his hips and shook his head. "Unlucky you. But, if you forfeit, you can leave the arena and get some from the medical ninja. Or, you can wait for the paralysis to set in, collapse in front of everyone, and _then_ the medical ninja will bring it to you." Miriki sighed and sat down with his legs crossed. "Your choice. Of course, you can always try to take me out in the next couple of seconds- but most likely you'll miss and look like an idiot. Hey, I'll tell you what: if you concede and decrease the work for me, then I promise not to make a move on Zandeina later."

Dako glowered, but gradually the hatred drained from his face, replaced with the sullen impassiveness he'd worn for most of the tournament. "I… ugh…" he winced and spat on the ground in disgust. "I forfeit." The second the words left his mouth, he frowned, moved his mouth around a bit, and then widened his eyes in horror. "What… how did…"

Miriki was already walking back up towards the other victors, hands in his pockets. Behind him, Dako Nakimoka waved a Medical Ninja over, but the Hyuga man seemed to look at him and then shrug. Even worse, the man's response was amplified by the sound increasing jutsu, so everyone in the arena heard what he said: "I don't think the Highriver Serpent is real, and if there _is_ such a thing as extract of etherweed, I've never heard of it." The Cloud genin's face hardened in rage, but the doctor continued (seemingly oblivious to the fact that his words were being blared out to everyone in the stadium. "To be honest, kid, I think you've been had."

Kenken seemed to finally find his voice. "Alright then, folks! Miriki defeats Dako using seemingly only his words in a… disappointing lack of action, to be honest." His voice dropped to a more personal tone, but then jumped right back into his energetic yell. "Come back tomorrow on day two of the chunin exams final tournament, for a day of heart-pounding excitement and intense battle!" _It comes down to those four,_ Kame thought. _Naruko, Miriki, Haku, and Sureki._


	19. Arc 2 Vol 9: Surpassing Limits

**Ninja Profile: Kenken Tagimata**

Ninjutsu: A  
Genjutsu: B  
Taijutsu: B

Description: Kenken is a tall Leaf jonin who wears typical green ninja clothing under his standard Leaf vest- but his clothing is the only normal thing about him. He has spiked brown hair and high eyebrows that make him look perpetually surprised, and his typical voice is as dramatic as a sports announcer's. He speaks, acts, and even moves with almost as much boundless enthusiasm as Rock Lee.

Origin: Kenken is from a no-name clan in the Hidden Leaf, but grew up eternally reading or hearing about famous battles between shinobi. He entered the academy and graduated quickly, promoting from genin to chunin and then to jonin rank in short order. Once there, he ended up specializing in information gathering and delivering: spy work, which is extremely difficult for many to believe given his strange mannerisms and social incompetence. The truth is, while he does go overboard (especially when proctoring the chunin exams) Kenken has great grasp of how people work and excellent analytical skills, making him one of the Hidden Leaf's strongest assets.

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"I'm telling you, don't beat yourself up over it." Miriki patted Kame on the back as they walked towards the arena exit. "Like I said before: Striving to achieve _my_ level of awesomeness is just a completely lost cause, so don't hold yourself to that standard. Just because I won my battle, doesn't mean-"

"Miriki?" Haku said calmly. When he stopped talking, she continued: "Stop talking."

Kame glanced over at his kunoichi teammate. _That's a lot more… direct… than she is usually. Is this because of the match with Tetsute?_ She turned to meet his eyes and he coughed, feeling his cheeks grow warm. "Uhmm… so, do you guys want to do dinner, or…?"

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Kame couldn't help but wonder how he'd ended up in this mess. _I thought this was gonna be a huge group dinner with everyone. How did we go from twelve people to one person in all of ten minutes? Deihaka disappearing with Senshiko and Miriki with Keikiro is to be expected, but… I guess it's my bad for expecting Shira, Rock Lee, Sureki, and Haku to all just sit still at a meal._ (The four taijutsu users had split off for a 'gloriously youthful last-minute training extravaganza'). _Then Sagino leaves with Kakuzen, and Gunaji goes along with them for god knows what reason, and now I'm walking into Ichiraku's alone._

He tried not to be bitter, but it was pretty difficult. Despite his rational mind knowing that it wasn't the case, he couldn't help but feel abandoned by the people who'd won where he'd lost. _That's right,_ he remembered. _I lost. Hard. I used up every drop of my chakra and had to forfeit before she did to me what she did to Keikiro._ _Now Miriki and Haku are put into the same boat, all because I got cocky and fell for all of her tricks._ After his first successful explosive attack, she'd bolted and left both an illusion _and_ a clone, and he'd fallen for both.

 _Maybe it's better this way,_ Kame considered. _I needed a wake-up call. I might have tried to help Haku and tolerate Miriki, but at the end of the day I still looked down on them both. Even after almost dying on my first mission, I still thought that I was the linchpin, the strongest member of our team- but when I went up against a real threat, one-on-one, I fell apart. Hell, even now Haku's off training to get better while I'm-_

"Hey, Kame!" Suddenly, Haku was standing next to him, grinning and tilting her head. "Are you just gonna stand outside the restaurant, or…?"

"I… Haku!" Kame wasn't sure what to say. "You came back."

"Yeah, well, when I saw Sagino with the other two I realized that you were here and I know how…" She trailed off, but the unfinished sentiment hung heavy in the air. In a flash of guilt, Kame remembered himself leaving her to eat alone on the night where it had all changed. _I don't deserve her friendship, but…_ _she doesn't deserve to lose one of her only friends._ He said none of it, instead finally pushing aside the curtain to move towards the bar-

And immediately, _sorely_ regretted his decision, because sitting there were the four Kage whose genin were in the tournament. _Oh, holy-_ Kame immediately turned one-eighty degrees and tried to move out of the small restaurant before he made a fool out of himself in front of two _more_ Kage, but Haku was already walking in. _Does she not realize who the hell is sitting there!?_ "Haku, those are the-"

"Hey, Gaara-san!" She waved as she slid into a seat one away from him, smiling slightly.

He turned to see her (reacting strangely similarly to Kame's initial panic upon entering the shop), gagging slightly on his ramen with bulging eyes, glancing briefly at the three other village leaders behind him, and then tightly responded to her. "Haku. It's good to see you here, at this restaurant, with the other Kage…"

She nodded, oblivious to Gaara's discomfort, before ordering a bowl of miso ramen and looking over at Kame quizzically. _I guess I'm doing this, now…_ He shrugged and walked over to sit beside her, ordering his own food. _There are four SS-class ninjas who decide the fate of nations sitting feet away from me._ He tried to gather up some willpower and start a conversation or something, but his voice failed him and the silence remained.

However, Haku did what he couldn't. "Anyway, I guess I'm missing the big training extravaganza, but… eh…"

Kame smiled a little bit. _So she is closer to us normal humans, then._ "Rock Lee and Shira both at the same time a little bit too much?"

She squirmed a little bit. "No, but… okay, yes. Lee-senpai and Shira-sensei are amazing, but sometimes I want to be around you more." She colored brightly as the words left her mouth, ducking to look at the counter. "No, wait- I mean, people _like_ you, because you're less… energetic? No, less…"

As she searched for the right word, Kame filled it in for her. "Youthful?"

She snorted at the reference to Rock Lee's interesting personality, shedding the awkwardness. "Yeah… not that you're old, or anything, but… I don't know. You're funnier, too."

Now it was Kame's turn to duck his head down in a futile attempt to hide his blush. However, when the next statement came from his left, it wasn't from Haku like he'd expected. In a serious, gruff voice that he'd never heard before, someone asked them: "Sand kunoichi… Haku, right?" A quick glance revealed its source to be Darui Ryukana, the fifth Raikage. "Where did you learn that technique that you used to defeat my daughter?"

 _Oh, shit… if he's looking for revenge, then-_ But Kame quickly realized that wasn't the case. The man appeared more curious than anything else, but Haku still froze up a little bit. _That's right, she doesn't even know that she has a kekkegenkai, much less that she's been using it._ Kame swept in to save her, speaking as confidently as he could to the Raikage. "Haku uses a chakra-reinforcement jutsu, with the addition that she can use nature changes. This is a new development for us as well, but my best guess is that while in her elemental 'stances' the respective elemental type is less effective against her?"

The Raikage briefly nodded, but then his brow furrowed and he started to ask another question. Gaara cut him off before he could do so: "Hey, you can't expect her to give up all of her secrets before the finals, can you? Especially in front of Naruto, no less." _That's right,_ Kame remembered. _Gaara and Naruto are the only two left with genin still in the running._

The Tanikage spoke up, and Kame got his first good look at the man. While his appearance was hidden by a mask that covered up his entire face, his voice was that of a young man. "Actually, that looked more like a very distinctive ability to me… although, I never thought that I'd see it again."

 _Does he know?_ Kame knew that he had to change the topic as quickly as possible for Haku's sake. "So, Lord Hokage, Naruko seemed to have something against you when I fought her in my match." _Bad move, Kame, stop it._ "What was that about?" _Why would you bring that up, you moron?_

Naruto set his mouth in a line. "Naruko… well, she's had…" _Way to make your hero self-conscious in front of his peers, Kame._ "Her mother was killed a few years ago in an escort mission that turned out to be a trap. Those who asked for the escort were actually simply looking to capture a high-ranking Leaf shinobi, but she was killed in the struggle. The ones who perpetrated the act were captured and dealt with, but… Naruko blames the gradual unification of the ninja world for it."

Haku and Kames' food arrived, and while Haku dug in eagerly, Kame was hesitant. "But… Lord Hokage, why is she so vicious-" _Too far,_ he thought. "I mean, sorry, I'm just being a sore loser."

Naruto shook his head. "No, you're right to think that, and you're absolutely right for worrying about the person that two of your teammates will have to fight. I have had words with her about the extremes she's gone to, and I hope that she'll change… but, you must understand, she aims high. Naruko…" he trailed off, leaving the bar uncomfortably silent.

Haku broke it when she raised her bowl towards Ayame. "Could I get another one?"

Kame started to eat his own food, and the Kage returned to their own conversations, leaving him and Haku together again. He looked over at her, and for some reason he grew uncomfortably aware of the fact that he was staring. _Has she always been this pretty?_ Kame knew he should probably turn away, but instead he sat completely still as she turned around to look at him. She tentatively smiled at him and he coughed, trying to think of something to say. "Uhmm…"

Haku's smile faded slightly as she seemed to remember something. "Kame, I just wanted to say that…" Kame's heartbeat thudded louder than he'd ever felt it before. "You shouldn't… don't beat yourself up over losing today."

He nodded quickly, tension of the situation gone, although a small part of him wished she _had_ taken it in the other direction. "I'm not beating myself up over it… at least, not anymore. I just wish that I could have protected you and Miriki from… well…"

She turned up from her food to face him, getting a little bit more serious. "I don't want to just be something for you to protect, though. I want to…" she trailed off.

Kame asked a question that had been digging at him for a long time. "Why do you want to become a shinobi?"

Haku glanced up at him sharply, and he momentarily worried that he'd struck a nerve. However, before he could apologize or backtrack, she just sighed and pushed her food back. "I don't really know. I think… I think at first, I wanted to get people to accept me, but…" _But when she tried, they didn't accept her, so…_ Kame felt awful for thinking it, but it was true. He knew, firsthand, how true it was. "I kept going because… what else would I do? I don't have any trade to learn, no family shop or farm to inherit, no… future."

Kame, acting on sheer instinct, grabbed her hand. Her gaze snapped up to meet his and she looked almost… scared, wide eyes confused and sad. "I…" _What do I say?_ "I think that you…" _Come on, Kame._ "I'm glad that you became a shinobi," he finally said as firmly as he could. "I like being on your team."

She flushed and swallowed, but the moment was broken when the Raikage at the other end of the counter stood up abruptly. "I'll see you all tomorrow," he said as he left, but some of the other Kage seemed to shush him for some reason. _Wait, were they watching us?_ Kame turned around quickly to see Gaara wearing an unreadable expression before the he could turn around and hide it. Naruto, on the other hand, made very little effort to hide the 'awww, that's adorable' face he was making.

The Tanikage also finished his food and stood. "Until tomorrow's fight, then." He exited the bar, white cloak with the green lettering fluttering behind him. _I wonder why he decided not to push the subject of Haku's kekkegenkai any further,_ Kame thought. When he turned back to Haku, she was polishing off the last of her third bowl and smiling at him.

"I'll pay for this one," she said, and before Kame could protest she was handing Ayame the money. When the transaction was done, she turned back to him and smiled one last time. "I'm going back to the inn, alright?" Kame wanted her to stay a bit longer, but didn't say anything as she left, trying to ignore the nagging memory of his abject failure to do the same thing back in Sunagakure. Naruto left as well, leaving Gaara and Kame alone at the bar. The silence hung thick and heavy, until-

"Kame." He looked up nervously towards the Kazekage. "Haku is…" the elder man seemed to be at a loss for words. "She is so much better than I can remember her ever being under my efforts." Kame wanted to protest the self-deprecation, but bit his tongue when he remembered all that Haku had been through under Gaara. "I was failing, but you… aren't. You made a promise to me and it's clear that you're keeping it."

Kame nodded. "I just want what's best for her."

The curtain to the shop was swept open and he somehow knew who it was before the loud voices sounded out from behind him. "Why, hello there, young friend of Haku! And you, Gaara!" There was only one ninja he'd ever met who spoke with that much unnecessary energy.

Gaara seemed to have the opposite reaction as Kame, brightening up and turning to face Rock Lee. "Hello, Lee!"

Kame took the chance to excuse himself back to the inn, nodding to Sureki as he passed the other boy. _I like Haku, and I like these people, but… I'm too tired for this._

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The arena was different when they returned. For one thing, there were now two viewing areas, one on each side of the arena, painted in the red of the Leaf and the yellow of the Sand. Kame was allowed to go down into the Sand box, as were any other genin who had passed the second test. Of course, the Valley genin came to their side, as did team seven from the Sand, but the Cloud team ended up in the Leaf's side (possibly because they'd all been knocked out by Sand shinobi in embarrassing ways.)

The second major change was that the voice amplification jutsu had been cranked up, and now the tournament placement brackets were replaced with rapidly changing screens. Kenken leapt down into the arena and pointed up into the sky, yelling maybe a bit _too_ loudly, "Welcome back to the ch- ch- ch- chunin exams!" the crowd tittered nervously. "And now, let's get right into today's matchups!

"From the Hidden Leaf side, we have the Hyuga heir, master of the Gentle Fist- although, those fists can be pretty rough if you're the one receiving them! With crushing victories against the rock-hard Sagino of the Hidden Valley and the Wood-release prodigy Kakuzen of the Hidden Leaf, please put your hands together for… Sureki Hyuga!" He dragged out the name far longer than it warranted, and the small boy flushed and hurried out to the center of the field, encouraged by scattered clapping.

"And now, from the Sand corner, we have another master of physical attacks, someone who took down Hidden Sand and Hidden Cloud prodigies alike with a single blow, and without even using any jutsu whatsoever… let's give a warm welcome to Haku!" another intro that was not reciprocated by the mild clapping of the crowd. Haku strode forward somewhat self-consciously, ditching the leg weights like Sureki had.

The two of them lined up in the central area of the arena, facing each other with clear tension visible in the air between them. Finally, Sureki turned to face the front row of the stands, and Kame followed his gaze to see (just barely) what looked like Rock Lee, Shira, Kankuro, Deihaka, Senshiko, and some other jonin watching. _Is that area reserved for the teachers…?_

Sureki cleared his throat, then said quietly, "Thank you for this, Lee-sensei."

Haku took the cue and followed suite. "Thank you, Shira-sensei."

For a moment, neither of them spoke, but then Sureki narrowed his eyes. "But you should also thank Lee-sensei, because without him Shira would never have-"

"You shut your mouth," Haku said fiercely. "Shira-sensei figured out how to achieve greater taijutsu than anyone else in the Hidden Sand without any teacher or mentor. Lee-sensei, as great as he is, still had Might Guy to watch over him."

Sureki narrowed his eyes and dropped into the Gentle Fist stance. "Lee-sensei was an inspiration to Shira."

Haku mirrored him, assuming her standard taijutsu stance. _From what I remember, Sureki uses Water style, which she can't absorb,_ Kame considered. She responded in the same tone, not quite hostile but definitely not friendly. "Just as Shira-sensei was an inspiration to Lee."

Kenken evidently decided to begin the battle formally before they did it informally. "Now, say it with me! Three!" (No one said it with him) "Two! One! Begin!"

The instant the words left his mouth, the two genin were upon each other. Haku launched a right hook, but as it was dodged she also swung out a sweeping leg. Sureki dove forward over the leg but under her guard and swung a fist towards her stomach, but somehow Haku twisted out of the way and rolled backwards. There was a brief lull, and then they engaged again, this time staying together. Their arms and legs became near-blurs as they demonstrated their mastery of the art of taijutsu. _If either of them got near me in a real fight, I'd be done for,_ Kame thought.

Finally, Sureki seemed to land a solid palm-strike onto Haku's midriff, which discharged a barely visible burst of chakra. Haku made up for it by kneeing the Hyuga in his own stomach, and the two backed off momentarily. Sureki let out a long breath and appeared to center himself, saying, "I'll show you and everyone here why I am worthy to inherit Lee-sensei's Nindo." The ground around him rippled slightly and a hazy aura shimmered into being around him. "Open, First Gate: Gate of Opening!"

Haku set herself as well, responding in a voice that was almost… _happy? Why is she so happy?_ "Seven Heavens, First Activation: Breath of Restraint!" The area around her shimmered with a yellowish color and her eyes began to glow white.

"Open, the Second Gate: Gate of Rest!" Kame's gaze turned back to Sureki, but-

"Second Activation: Breath of Strength!" _What!? Again with this technique..._ Kame knew that opening the eight inner gates had a brutal cost, and if this was any indication Haku's seven breaths might well have one, too. Her muscles became more pronounced and her hair began drifting as thought gravity's pull on it had weakened.

"Third Gate: Gate of Life! Open!" Sureki's voice held noticeable strain in it as the ground at his feet began to chip away and crack from the power he emitted. His skin actually changed color into a reddened state, veins pulsing through his skin. _How long is this going to go on? Won't they-_

Then Sureki disappeared from Kame's view and reappeared behind Haku, who was mid-turn to deal with him. "Eight Trigrams: Two Palms!" Both attacks were redirected by Haku. "Four Palms! Eight Palms! Sixteen Palms!" To Kame, the blows seemed to come so fast that they were a blur of white sleeve and pale skin in the air before Sureki, but Haku managed to keep all of them from making any serious contact.

"Thirty-Two Palms!" This time, a few of them got through her guard and staggered her backwards. _This is bad,_ Kame realized, _in that state she'll be off-balance for the-_ "Sixty-Four Palms!" The barrage of attacks came in the space of only three seconds, but almost all of them made solid contact with Haku. _I know she did good against him before, and he said that he couldn't hit her tenketsu points, but there has to be a limit… I've read about how gentle fist users can destroy the internal organs of their targets!_

Haku slid to a stop, the ground cracking behind her feet. She seemed to open her mouth to say something else, but before she could say anything Sureki's voice filled the field. "The Gentle Fist of my clan is considered perfect, swaddled in tradition and passed down exactly as it has been for generations." _Where is he going with this?_ "Sixty-Four Palms hits all sixty-four chakra points in the human body, so anything else would be… unnecessary." Sureki lowered into a dash, coming at Haku with arms held ready. "However, I won't be held back by the limitations of tradition. In this state, I can go far beyond what the other of my clan deemed possible! _Sixteen_ Trigrams: One-Hundred-Twenty-Eight Palms!"

 _Oh, no._ Sureki battered Haku with even more strikes than before, and this time she was thoroughly outclassed. The other boy's speed and accuracy, coupled with the strength increase from opening the gates, was far too much for Haku to deal with, and she was battered back and then up into the air. For a moment, she hung there, and then Sureki appeared behind her in a move that Kame knew all too well. _No… I don't think she can take that and still-_

"Third Activation: Breath of Speed!" Haku was no longer in the air before her opponent, instead standing halfway across the arena. The ground between where she had been and where she was now was ripped into shredded fragments, and the chips of earth at her feet were floating from the sheer chakra in the air. _How is she… I was watching her the whole time, but she moved faster than I could even register!_

Sureki landed on the earth, red skin and muscles failing to cover up the fact that he was breathing heavily- but so was Haku. Both fighters looked winded, but they straightened. When Haku spoke, it was in her normal voice, surprising given her now-purple skin. _Wait, what?_ Her skin was indeed purple, and the same sort of veins were pronounced as they were for Sureki. _So she does use a similar technique to the Eight Gates…_

Then the two of them simply disappeared and the fight reached a level of speed far beyond the ability of Kame's untrained eyes to comprehend. The two of them blinked around the battlefield, becoming visible only for brief moments where their blows connected. The crowd's silence turned into a dull roar of people's disbelief or praise at the display of high martial skill, and Kame heard Tetsute's sharp intake of breath behind him. _This is what you bullied,_ Kame thought a bit too smugly.

"I… will… not… disappoint… Lee-sensei!" Sureki's defiant voice sounded out as they solidified a bit, locked in a fierce exchange of blows in the middle of the arena.

"I won't lose!" Haku's shout went right back. Kame could barely pick out flashes of them through the whirlwind of blows- _it's impossible to tell who's winning now… I just have to hope._

Sureki suddenly spun and unleashed an expanding sphere of chakra around him. "Sixteen Trigrams: Sustained Rotation!" Compared to when he'd used it against Kakuzen, the hurricane of chakra surrounding him was larger and far more vicious- and it wasn't stopping. The Hyuga boy moved forward still surrounded by his wall of destructive chakra, forcing Haku to move back further and further. _She can't get to him while he's in there,_ some part of Kame realized. _This might be bad…_

Haku seemed to focus in, and then lowered herself into a sprinting position and took off towards Sureki's left. _What is she doing?_ She quickly transcended visibility, blurring into a streak of purple that went around and around Sureki, and then closed in. _Wait, is she…_ Her form pushed into the spinning wall of chakra and then seemed to _merge_ with it, turning to a line of purple that spiraled further and further inwards until it met the center.

Then it all went away and Sureki was flying upwards, head tilted backwards. Haku streaked up into the air beside him. "I have people that I won't disappoint as well!" Somehow, Kame knew that he was one of them. She spun in the air and then her leg came crashing down onto her opponent's chest: "Hidden Devil!"

This time, she followed her opponent down through the air, a barrage of kicks and punches pushing him faster and faster downwards until a final, brutal blow slammed him face-first into the ground. When she stood up, Sureki didn't, remaining still and flat on his chest. A few stunned seconds later, Kenken shouted: "And in a blistering final combination attack, we have our first entrant for the final match! Winner by knockout: Haku!"


	20. Arc 2 Vol 10: The Unstoppable Uchiha

**(A/N) Super early update today, but I'm going back through a few of the earlier chapters to clean up grammar. The biggest changes will probably be to the Tetsute vs. Haku fight, but most of the chapters are getting quality-of-life changes. The overall plot will progress the same so there's no need to reread if you don't want to.**

 **Civilian Profile: Ginsenbo Kosuki**

Ninjutsu: ?  
Genjutsu: S  
Taijutsu: ?  
Specialties: Hatogan, Politics, Genjutsu

Description: Ginsenbo is the perfect Kosuki specimen- tall, graceful, with perfectly kept dark hair and bright blue eyes with seven-pointed stars in them. He perpetually maintains good form and is an excellent actor- he can be shy, demanding, angry, sad, studious or lazy depending on what he needs in order to win someone over. His usual clothing is a white and blue uniform underneath a white robe with blue lining, the traditional clothing for a Kosuki nobleman.

Origin: Ginsenbo was born a child to the brother of the Kosuki patriarch, but through his excellent social skills and rapidly developed Hatogan, he rose through the ranks of the clan quickly. Unlike the Hyuga of the leaf (or most clans) the Kosuki do not have main and branch families. Instead, the clan head is chosen in a cutthroat social and political battle that begins with the death or embarrassment of the previous leader. Ginsenbo was perfect where his cousin Miriki was flawed, and through excellent maneuvering and success in the court he managed to earn himself the favor of the clan head, to the point of replacing his son as the face of the clan.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Sureki regained consciousness a short while after the fight was concluded, and (shakily) refused the help of the medical ninja as he walked back to the Leaf area. Haku, who had stayed on the field to enjoy the thunderous cheering, spoke to him shortly before moving to the Sand box. Once she'd climbed the steps, Kame moved to congratulate her- but someone else did it first.

Tetsute, not meeting her eyes and speaking with stilted awkwardness, said, "Good fight."

Haku met his eyes. "Thank you."

 _It's not friendship, it's not acknowledgement, it's not apology, but…_ as Haku walked away from Tetsute, Kame saw the wistfulness on her face. _Maybe it's enough, for now._ Kame smiled and turned back to the field as she came up beside him, but froze up when she put her arm over his shoulder and leaned on him. _What?_ He shot a quick glance over at her face and she seemed a lot more haggard than she'd been only seconds ago. _Was she putting on a tough act in front of the crowd?_

"Haku, are you… all right?" He tried to keep his voice down, but the worry seeped in.

"Yeah, I should… be okay…" She mumbled. "Shira said that… the breaths eat up… a lot of chakra…" _She seems exhausted,_ Kame thought. _Will she be able to fight… wait, her opponent is determined in this next match._ He looked up towards the arena just in time to watch Kenken start in on his next ridiculous introduction.

"And now, for the final battle of the semifinals, we have the ever-suave Miriki Kosuki of the Hidden Sand, who's made it through two full rounds without making a single attack- and won the last battle apparently without using ninjutsu, genjutsu, _or_ taijutsu! Can he keep it up and rack up another win?" As Miriki sauntered out onto the field, half the crowd seemed to be cheering and the other half was silent or muttering.

"Or will it be our other competitor, from the Leaf side: the girl who destroyed the opposition-" Kame winced a little bit "-with fire and fury in both rounds leading up to this, who aced both previous stages of the exams and masters ninjutsu and genjutsu alike… Naruko Uchiha!" The crowd went wild as she stalked out onto the field, making Kame just a little bit disgusted with the gathered shinobi and civilians.

The two ninjutsu stood facing each other in the middle of the arena, Miriki faintly smirking while Naruko was staring at him with derision. Kenken waited for the crowd to fall mostly silent, and then yelled, "Are you ready for the second-to-last battle of this year's chunin exams? Well, ready or not, here we go! Three! Two! One! Start!"

It took a few seconds after he set them off, and then Miriki activated hatogan and launched into his normal tactics. "Hey, Naruko. What's up? Feel like forfeiting?"

She responded with a shuriken whipped forward towards him that he barely dodged. "How about you?"

He made an unpleasant face. "Eh, not really. I think you should, though."

Another shuriken whipped towards him, but he dodged that one as well. "Why should I forfeit to you, loser?"

"Well, first off, I'm not a loser; I won every round leading up to here- if I'm a loser, then so are you-" he had to duck under another shuriken. "And secondly, if you forfeit now you save yourself a lot of embarrassment and time."

Naruko scowled. "Do you seriously think I'll fall for some stupid lie, like that Hidden Cloud idiot? How are you going to beat me?"

Miriki shrugged. "I guess I'll just wing it? I don't know, things kind of just work out for me usually." Naruko's hand refilled itself with shuriken, but he didn't flinch. "Besides, this whole thing would be a lot easier for both of us if you just… forfeited."

"Like I'm gonna forfeit to a weakling like you!" Naruko ran through the handsigns for the Fireball Jutsu, but Miriki was still unfazed.

"Weakling? I'm offended, but you know what?" She didn't answer. "At least I'm not an insufferable bitch like you are."

"Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu!" The flaming attack flew right past Miriki, and Kame briefly wondered if his teammate was onto something. _Is she so angry that her aim is taking a hit?_

"I can't understand why your teammates put up with your angry, insecure, angsty 'I-will-purge-the-world-of-weakness' act, but I could never deal with it for as long as I assume they have." Miriki shrugged. "I mean, the little effeminate one who just got whooped by Haku I kinda understand, he's got it bad for you-" she threw out another two shuriken, forcing him to dodge downwards. "-I don't blame him; at face value you're pretty appealing, but personality-wise I gotta give you a three out of ten."

"I don't care!" She ran through another set of signs. "Fire Style: Phoenix Flame Jutsu!" The volley of smaller fireballs forced Miriki to roll backwards and dodge a few times, the last one clipping the edge of his cloak and singeing the white cloth.

"Oh, for the love of-" Miriki patted the burned area. "Really? You're taking your anger issues out on my coat now?"

Naruko raised a shuriken, but loosened up slightly before throwing it. "Oh, shut up, you annoying dandy. Are you sure you even want to be a ninja? All you've done so far is talk…"

Miriki actually _smiled_ , not a smirk or a patronizing grin, at her attempt at verbal sparring. "Ohh, that was a good attempt- but you're attacking the wrong way. Here, let me show you:" he crossed his arms and raised an eyebrow at her. "Are you sure you want to be a ninja? All you've done is complain about the ninja world, and yet here you are trying your damnedest to earn your way into it!" She narrowed her eyes, but he wasn't done. "Wait- I just realized, there's a win-win solution to this!"

"What?" Naruko still held the shuriken, but seemed interested in what he had to say.

"Well, if you just forfeit-" Miriki was cut off when she growled and threw the shuriken at him, forcing him to roll to the side. When he stood, there was already a fireball jutsu headed straight for him. Even as he ran backwards, he was still complaining, "Are we seriously doing this? If you would just-" The fireball caught up to him just as he reached the river, but he dove under the waters and avoided being burned.

When he stood up from the water, he was dripping wet and looked annoyed about it. "Water Style: Condensation Jutsu!" The air around him misted up and then formed into droplets of water, which pattered to the ground. _Wait, did he just use a jutsu to dry his clothes off? Why would he waste time and chakra mastering something like that!?_ "Anyway, you almost managed to ruin my beautiful look, but…"

Naruko made the cross handsign. "Shadow Clone Jutsu!" Four more of her filled the ground around her and then fanned out and began to rain shuriken at Miriki. For the first time since the match began, Miriki was forced to drop his cool-guy act and run along the riverbed towards the treeline. Somehow, he made it to the wooded forest and disappeared from view- although, his voice didn't stop coming. "Hey, can you stop attacking me like some rabid- oh, wait no, my bad. I forgot who I was talking to."

Naruko growled and unleashed a fireball into the trees, then another, methodically burning up patches of the forest. Miriki, seemingly unfazed, simply continued his verbal barrage. "So, anyway, I guess I'm gonna have to actually try this time, huh? What a bother."

Naruko whirled around and narrowed her eyes as Miriki walked out from the treeline _behind_ her. _How did he get over there? Substitution, or-_ "You think a cheap illusion like that will fool me?"

Miriki came running forwards from the flaming patch of forest. "No, but it did protect me long enough to seal your fate. This is my ultimate jutsu; a Hokage-level technique that was used against Kaguya Otsutsuki by your grandfather when every other jutsu had failed." _What!? Since when does Miriki know Kage-level offensive jutsu!?_ Kame was flabbergasted that his teammate had been concealing such a trump card from them the whole time.

Naruko entered a defensive stance. "I don't believe you."

Miriki grinned. "Maybe you will after I defeat you with it. Now, straight from the teachings of Naruto Uzumaki, here it comes!" _Will he succeed where I failed?_ "Sexy Jutsu: Reverse Harem Jutsu!"

Kame lost the ability to even think for a few seconds, every bit of mental space he had too busy registering what was happening on the battlefield. Miriki disappeared in a cloud of summoning smoke and then several idealized, glistening men clad in nothing but their underwear were rushing forward towards Naruko. As she fell backwards under the swarm of seductive male bodies, Kame finally regained his wits. _Miriki, you creepy, perverted, useless, pathetic… argh!_

Miriki himself stood back from the… _it's not really fighting, is it?_ Whatever it was, the Kosuki was grinning and standing with his hands behind his head, altogether _far_ too pleased with what was going on. _You idiot, you just molested another contestant in front of a crowd of thousands, and now you're just standing there looking all happy?_ The crowd in question seemed to regain their voices and began booing, which Miriki ignored.

What did pull his cocky head out of the clouds was the shriek of rage from behind him and then the mass puff that came from illusions being cleared out. "You think… I'm going to lose to… What is _wrong_ with you…" She was literally incoherent with rage and disgust.

He looked at her briefly and then nodded. "Again, I underestimated you. A mistake on my part, to be sure… but I won't make it again." He set himself in a solid stance for the first time so far in the match… no, the entire exams. "Perhaps this is what you were looking for instead?" _Wait, no-_ but it was too late, and now Miriki was masked behind an illusion of an idealized version of Sureki, with far more muscle mass and a confident expression on his face.

Naruko twitched in rage. "No, you perverted, unprofessional-"

"Ohhh… I get it now, you're into this." Another puff of smoke, and now he was an idealized Sureki far in the other direction, even more thin and feminine. He struck a pose slightly bent over, with one hand on his knee and the other one on his mouth, and winked at her. "Hey there, _mistress,_ how about we-"

Naruko seemed to have completely had enough. "That's enough!" She flared her eyes and ran through a new set of signs that Kame hadn't seen before. "Wind Style: Inescapable Grasp Jutsu!" The burst of wind swept around Miriki… and completely ignored him.

"Hey, I think that might work better if you hit _me_ with it, rather than my illusion…" The 'illusory' Miriki from before waved at her, face nonplussed. "But, you know, that's just a suggestion. Take it or leave it."

She growled in rage and tossed a smokebomb at her feet, which spread out gradually across the clearing. After a little while, the smoke gradually cleared out- to reveal Naruko throwing a few kunai at him, which all missed. _What!?_ She flinched and put a hand to her mouth, saying, "Uck- what is this… oh, genjutsu." Naruko straightened up and clearly shook off his taste alteration, then made a few signs.

Miriki had landed shakily and turned around to face her. "You're really dead set on attacking me, huh?"

"Yes, you moron, because this is the ninja world and-" She was cut off suddenly, backing away from him with eyes wide. "What!? You never… that's not… how…"

Miriki smirked. "What, surprised? I don't blame you, but please get over it soon. When I establish myself as the dominant sharingan user of our generation, I want it to be against you in an even battle."

 _Sharingan!? How is he… wait, it's just another genjutsu, isn't it?_ Naruko, though, was backing away in horror. "I'm the one who has sharingan… you don't get…" She stumbled a little bit and then appeared to gather herself and draw her kunai. "I don't know how you got those eyes, but this is-"

Miriki smiled. "And so the genjutsu is accepted and made complete. Now, Hatogan Secret Art: Mind Execution." Naruko quavered in place and then sank to her knees, eyes closed. "I really didn't want to have to do all this, but you wouldn't just forfeit, so…" he shrugged and started to walk away. "It's your fault, I guess."

And then the Naruko that had been sitting there disappeared into a puff of smoke and with a yell from the treeline of, "Wind Style: Inescapable Grasp Jutsu!" Miriki was yanked towards the real Naruko. She took a swing at him with her kunai hilt, and he managed to just barely duck underneath it- but failed to dodge the kick that planted him in his midsection and knocked him backwards.

She ran through the Fireball Jutsu handsigns, but Miriki had already finished preparing his own jutsu: "Substitu…" he trailed off and then froze in place, before widening his eyes. _What's going on? Did she catch him in a genjutsu? He looks terrified…_ Miriki's face went from shock, to horror, to anger, and then- "You're not worth all this effort. I forfeit." _After all that? He's…_ Kame remembered his own surrender and shook his head. _I can't hold him to a higher standard than myself, especially if I don't respect him as a ninja…_

Kenken accepted the words, but before saying anything he seemed to glance suspiciously towards the stands. "I… guess that means that Naruko Uchiha wins by concession!"

Naruko honestly looked as though she was going to finish her fireball right then and there, but gathered control over herself in time and simply stalked off towards the Leaf viewing area. _Miriki…_ Kame watched with a lot more empathy than he thought he'd have as his ever-cocky teammate hurried over to their box, illusion of invincibility shattered. _I actually thought that you were going to win… maybe you even fooled me along with everyone else._

When his black-haired teammate trudged up onto their level, he wore an expression of disgust more than anything. "Hey, everyone… Sorry."

Haku shook her head. "Don't apologize for trying your hardest."

Kame couldn't hold it back any longer. "But you didn't! Why did you just…" _I'm being a bad teammate._ He swallowed his anger, but snapped his eyes upward when Miriki responded.

"You're right, I didn't." Kame expected to see an expression of smug confidence, but instead Miriki was sorrowful more than anything else.

Kenken's voice came sounding out through the arena. "And with that, folks, we have our two competitors for the final match of the chunin exams! It'll be Haku, the Purple Death of the Hidden Sand, versus Naruko Uchiha, the Red Fury of the Hidden Leaf! Don't miss when these two duke it out in half an hour!" _So they give us a short break between the matches…_

A few minutes of small talk later, the passageway that led to the stands from the Sand area spat out several shinobi- "Master Kankuro!" Kame said with delight, just as Haku greeted Shira and Miriki welcomed Deihaka.

"So…" Kankuro narrowed his eyes. "Do you realize that when you use your puppet as a suicide bomber, it may as well just be a lump of useless wood?"

 _I knew he'd be angry about that…_ "Uh… Well, at the time it-"

"That said, you did do an admirable job managing Wasp yesterday." Kame let a little pride creep into his smile- "Until you blew it up."

Shira was congratulating Haku, who glowed with the praise. Kame remembered something he'd been wondering about and approached the strange pair. "Hey, Shira-san, Haku. That Seven Heavens technique… is it going to hurt Haku's chances in the finals?"

Shira shook his head. "No. We did some chakra network analysis, and… well, Haku isn't like most people. Her body is already used to chakra augmentation, and the limiters are mostly broken without even using any Breaths, so when she does use the ones we've unlocked so far there isn't any lasting damage. However, the Breaths do eat up a _lot_ of chakra, and the real danger is her getting completely chakra exhausted." _So she needs chakra to fuel her taijutsu rather than ninjutsu or genjutsu._ "That said, she does have a surprisingly quick chakra recovery rate, so she should be close to alright in the finals..

Kame nodded, but Kankuro grabbed his arm and turned him around. "I wasn't done speaking with you."

"Sorry, Master Kankuro…" _I wonder if I'll ever stop annoying him…_

"Bah, just… anyway, I think that your idea of rigging Wasp to explode was going in the right direction. If we could arm the puppets with explosives, then…" The older jonin stopped and looked thoughtful.

Kame brightened up a little bit, thinking of the possibilities. "If we loaded them with a pile of paperbombs and then put a wheel at the top of the pile, then rolling it would push the papers forward one at at a time. We could spit them out in rapid succession like the needles!"

"Yes, but that would only for surprise attacks from above. The puppets can't very well fold the paperbombs into aerodynamic shapes like you do, so the attacks would be slow and only move downwards."

Kame remembered when enemies had used paperbombs against him. "What if we attached paperbombs to the heavier, single-use attacks, like Wasp's legs? That way, Wasp could have, say, four missiles to use in the fight, and since the legs can't be moved after being fired anyway…" _Then I would have to key a separate sign onto each of the paperbombs,_ he thought. _I think it's past time for me to start doing that, anyway… I can't be limited to one at a time of each bomb type._

Kankuro nodded sagely. "Okay, but then if- no, you could fix that easily. My question is, do you think your paperbombs could remain working when rolled tight?"

"As long as the seal remains undamaged, theoretically yes…" Kame realized where his mentor was going. "Oh, do you think we could make the needles into paperbomb-type weapons?" A nod. "Okay, but then I think I'd have to make them explode on a timer or impact-based system, because due to the rapid-fire nature of the needles a sign to make them explode would destroy all of the needles in the air." _The possibilities are endless._

"Of course." Kankuro quieted down as someone else approached from behind them. Kame peered over the man's shoulder and raised his eyebrows in surprise to see Sureki Hyuga make his way towards their group. He shot Miriki a dirty look (which was justified, given the way the Kosuki had made fun of him in the last fight) but walked straight over to Kame.

"Kame, I need to talk to you about something."

"Shoot." Kame was confused about what the white-clad boy could want with him.

"I…" Sureki dropped his voice to a near-whisper. "It's about Haku, so… with all these people around…?"

 _Did he see something in that last fight?_ "Uhm, sure." Kankuro remained, but when Sureki glanced at him he just crossed his arms and didn't move. Kame gave him an 'it's okay' nod and made an expectant face.

Sureki continued in the same near-whisper. "I saw your Kazekage yesterday, and… you know how most chakra is considered to be a blueish color?" Kame nodded. "Yeah, well the Kazekage had another color of chakra running through his gourd and super densely around his stomach- it reminds me of Lord Naruto's orange chakra from the ninetails."

Kankuro seemed to tighten up a little bit, speaking in a controlled and constricted voice. "Yeah, yeah, Gaara has the onetail sealed inside of him. Where are you going with this?"

The Hyuga genin, seemingly oblivious to his senior's discomfort, continued. "So, the… onetail chakra, it was more of a golden, yellowish color, right? When I fought Haku today, I attacked her with a _lot_ of Gentle Fist strikes, and the chakra I attacked her with chipped away at the seal over her chakra points. The bits of the seal that-" Kankuro had his hand over Sureki's mouth almost instantly.

"You need to stop speaking, now. You're _very_ close to breaking some very huge rules." While not angry, Kame's mentor's expression was annoyed as he interrupted the Leaf genin. _Is he worried about Sureki spreading the information that Haku is a jinchuriki?_ "I recommend that you drop this subject and don't bring it up again, understood?"

Sureki frowned but nodded, and Kankuro removed his hand. "Okay."

At that moment, a small flash of white caught Kame's eye. He glanced over and saw the Kosuki man from a few days before approach Miriki. "Are you about finished here? I'd like to leave this place as soon as possible."

"Yeah, sorry Ginsenbo, but I'm gonna stay here and watch the final… feel free to go back to your mansion and shove the silver spoon back up your ass, though. I'll manage without your stuck-up whining somehow." Miriki looked at his relative with naked distaste.

The older Kosuki twitched his nose in disgust and flashed his eyes. The hatogan spun into being within them, but his hatogan had _seven_ points. He did something that caused Miriki to flinch defensively. "I will remind you to watch your tongue, cousin. I think that the ending of your last match would be enough to keep you complacent, but…" _What? Did he interfere with the fight?_

Miriki growled but dropped his eyes. "My apologies, Ginsenbo. I will remain and watch the next match, and return to the Sand with my team. You may come with us or return on your own, whichever you'd prefer."

Ginsenbo whirled around and glided off. "Your parents and I will expect you back soon. We have found a suitable heir for you to court, despite your… lack of decorum." As the man's white robe disappeared into the passageway, the Kosuki clan's crest (a blue-pupiled eye staring directly forward) was swallowed up by the darkness.

Then Kenken's amplified voice came screaming out from the arena. "Only fifteen minutes until you all get to witness the fight of your lives! That's fight, the greatest young ninja the Hidden Sand and Hidden Leaf have to offer will duke it out right before your eyes in only five minutes!"

Somehow, that statement finally broke whatever mental repression Kame had put in place and he helplessly walked over towards Haku. She looked up with a smile as he approached but it turned to a frown as he stopped, unable to force a smile in return. "Haku, you…" _She can't win against Naruko._ "Will you… forfeit, before she…"

Haku's expression changed to one of discontent. "I won't just give up when you and all the others put your faith in me. You all gave it- gave me- your faith, and I'm not gonna be the failure that you taught me I wasn't."

Kame could only see the figure of Naruko standing over him, over Keikiro, over Miriki, ready to burn them all to ash to fulfill her ambitions. _She won't hesitate to hurt Haku, and worse… Haku can't stop her. If she gets hit by any genjutsu, she's done for._ "I believe in you, but…" _You can't let her get hurt._ "You can't win this fight. She's too strong, and you don't have any jutsu to use against her- you can't escape any of her genjutsu." He saw Haku grow more and more hurt as he continued, but sure in his purpose of trying to protect her from getting injured before a huge crowd, he carried on. _She won't forfeit,_ he thought. _Even if things are bad and she can't win, she won't surrender._ "You aren't capable of beating her. She's practically a fully-capable ninja-"

Kame realized he'd gone too far as she flushed and turned away from him, walking off towards the stairs that led down into the arena. _I shouldn't have said that._ He remembered Tetsute saying that against a real ninja, she'd be helpless. _Why did I…_ he cursed himself for hurting her after all his promises to help her. _Those were all just empty words, huh?_

He was left to just watch as she walked out onto the field to stand opposite the Uchiha that had eliminated both of her teammates. Kenken eyed both of them, and then shouted (loud enough to make Kame wince) "It started with ninety-nine genin from all over the world, and now we're down to the two strongest! Who will walk away from this tournament as the victor of the chunin exams!? Will it be the Purple Fury of the Hidden Sand, or the Red Death of the Hidden Leaf!?" _Is it just me, or did he swap their titles?_ "We'll find out now! Three! Two! One! Let the final match of the chunin exams… begin!"


	21. Arc 2 Vol 11: Shattered Peace

**Ninja Profile: The Tanikage**

Ninjutsu: S  
Genjutsu: ?  
Taijutsu: ?  
Specialties: Anti-Ninja skills, Sealing, Secrecy

Description: The Tanikage is of a normal height, speaking in a youthful voice, but none have ever seen him outside of his white-and-green Tanikage robes.

Origin: The same Tanikage has led the Village Hidden in the Valleys for centuries, since its formation, never seeming to age or weaken. His presence alone is said to be what kept the Hidden Valley safe during the Shinobi World Wars, and he has never lost a battle. The few times his village _was_ attacked, he has not only seen the attack coming ahead of time and cut off the invaders but also defeated most of them by himself. The only time he has ever acted offensively is when he eradicated the Heat Devil Village for reasons unknown, but other than that his extreme prowess and relative neutrality has kept the Hidden Valley Village safe for centuries.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Naruko started the match without words, instead launching a fireball right off the bat. Haku dodged it with a quick roll, only to look up and see a shuriken flying towards her, forcing her to duck and go off-balance. Another shuriken towards the off-balance Haku drew blood, clipping her forearm and sending a small streak of red into the air. _It's like my match,_ Kame thought. _Naruko isn't giving her any time to think or plan._

Haku looked forward and then visibly flinched at the last second, flinging her head to the side quickly to avoid meeting her opponent's eyes. The Uchiha girl took advantage of the momentary distraction, running through a set of signs and then shouting, "Fire Style: Phoenix Flame Jutsu!"

The blasts of fire flew towards Haku, but she managed to evade them all without making any errors and then backed away. _Good move. If her plan is to dodge, then distance between them will make it a lot easier._ Naruko came to the same conclusion and began stalking forward- which was exactly what Haku was waiting for. The purple-clad kunoichi tore forward from a standstill and closed the distance in mere moments, swinging up a fist that met with thin air- "Substitution!" Naruko stood by the river, the stone that she'd swapped with dropping the the ground. "Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu!" Another burst of flames flew forward across the arena, singeing the ground as it traveled, but Haku saw it in time to leap aside.

 _Naruko must have extreme amounts of chakra,_ Kame considered. _She's been throwing out jutsu like shuriken, even high-cost ones like the Shadow Clone Jutsu. I suppose she does have some Uzumaki blood, so that may contribute to it… but that can't be all. Did she inherit some of the ninetails' chakra stores?_ She was tracking Haku with her eyes, launching another volley of kunai. Once again, Haku rolled aside to avoid the knives, and the stalemate dragged on.

Suddenly, Naruko spoke, dropping her combat stance for the moment. "What drives you?" _What is she talking about?_ Kame remembered himself asking a similar question the night before, but this was hardly a place for that discussion- _Is she pulling a page from Miriki's book? Trying to knock Haku off of her game?_ "You're not a weakling like the other two in your team. I respect that you've gone this long through the exam without using a single jutsu- if you're trying to prove dominance, you're succeeding." _Wait, she's making the same assumption as Zandeina._ Kame wondered why she would do that when she had a jutsu-less ninja in her own village.

Haku didn't leave her ready stance. "They aren't weaklings. Kame and Miriki don't deserve the hatred you've directed towards them." Naruko raised her eyebrows bemusedly. "I don't know what you've been through, or what you're thinking, but whatever it is doesn't give you the right to do the things you've done."

"My strength as a shinobi gives me the right to do the things I've done!" Naruko was angry in her response. "Are you seriously telling me that, with the strength that you possess, you're walking down the road of the losers?"

"My strength comes from the faith that the others put in me." Haku sounded less sure of herself than before, and Kame knew why. _I shouldn't have told her to give up._ "I wouldn't be standing here if it weren't for their efforts."

"You sound like my damn grandfather," Naruko seethed. "'The Power of Friendship' is bull crap. Strength in numbers may be great and all, but in the face of a real enemy or out there in the field, relying on your teammates is a crutch!"

Haku shook her head. "After all that Naruto Uzumaki did to end the war and hate in our world, you want it to come back." Despite the words leaving her mouth, her voice lacked conviction.

"The hate is still there, but now only our enemies have it and the strength it gives them!" Naruko growled angrily.

Haku visibly wavered. "No, it- it isn't…" she trailed off. _She knows that it's still there, because she's felt it herself._

The Leaf kunoichi noticed her opponent's indecision and seized upon it. "When the enemies come for Kame, or Miriki, will their complaints help them? Will the fact that _if_ their friends were there, they'd work well together, help them?" She glared towards the Sand box. "They're weaklings, who forfeited rather than take a few hits and don't deserve the name shinobi. We're not like they are, and as long as they're around they're dragging _us_ down with them."

"Kame is not weak!" Haku found her voice again. "You may have won against him, but he is not weak. He's stronger than I am, and I didn't drag him down; he dragged me up!" Kame felt... strange, hearing her actually say the words out loud. _Even after what I just said, she still has faith in me, is grateful to me._

Naruko frowned. "I don't understand, if you're _as strong_ as them without even using… wait…" She widened her eyes. "Medical ninjutsu is far enough along that even people with underdeveloped chakra coils can use jutsu, so I assumed… but somehow, you _still_ managed to become jutsu-less?" She sounded angry, _very_ angry, at being made a fool. "I guess this is gonna suck for you, then!"

Haku flinched at nothing and then wobbled a little bit, sinking to one knee. _What? Did she accidentally look into Naruko's eyes and get hit with the paralysis!?_ "What…" _No, she can still move, so…_

"This vertigo genjutsu is transmitted on my voice," Naruko said while flashing through the handsigns for the Fireball Jutsu. "Honestly, it's usually not even worth the chakra, since most ninja can just release it pretty easily. But you…" she sighed. "Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu!"

The huge spray of flame tore forward and Haku shuffled to the side, throwing herself out of the way but landing in a heap. _She can't use genjutsu release to get out,_ Kame realized. _What's she going to do? Is the rest of the fight gonna be in this state?_ Haku stumbled to her feet, nearly falling back over again, and then shuffled back towards the forest, taking a shuriken to the back of the arm but managing to avoid the rest of Naruko's barrage. _Can she… wait, if she hurts herself she might be able to escape it… but then she'd just hear Naruko's voice and be back in the same boat._

Naruko called out towards the forest, "Hey, hiding won't save you. To think that you made it this far through the tournament without any jutsu… but this is the end of your streak of luck. Fire Style: Phoenix Flower Jutsu!" A barrage of fireballs flew into the trees, spreading flames into the forest at equal intervals. In minutes, there would be no forest left to hide in.

"Seven Heavens, First Activation: Breath of Restraint!" Haku came running from the treeline at inhuman speed, rapidly eating up the distance between her and Naruko. Naruko seemed to focus on something briefly and then panic when it didn't work, jumping backwards and throwing a few shuriken at the charging enemy. The projectiles were simply batted aside as Haku continued her rush and made it to Naruko, unleashing an uppercut that smashed into the Uchiha's jaw- and then continued upwards, shattering the large stone that was in Naruko's place.

Naruko, having again substituted next to the river, shouted angrily: "Covered up your ears? Clever, but you still can't hit me. Fire Style: Fireball Jutsu!" Looking at Haku, Kame could see that she did have her headband uncharacteristically wrapped around her head rather than her neck, holding in shreds of her bandages that were stuffed in her ears. _She blocked off her ears and then hurt herself, breaking the genjutsu and stopping it from catching her again… clever._

The fireball flew towards Haku, but with her senses back she dodged around it and kept charging towards her foe. Naruko turned and fled, calling out, "Wind Style: Wind Cushion Jutsu!" The burst of air pushed her forward faster than her legs could carry her and she hit the ground running in a full sprint towards the treeline.

Haku yelled, "Second Activation: Breath of Strength!" as she made it to the river, and then started laying waste to the rocks. _She's destroying the Substitution Jutsu targets,_ Kame thought. _Taking away another one of Naruko's options._ However, it seemed that the Leaf genin wasn't going to just let her do it, as another fireball came flying in from the trees. Haku dodged it, hopping towards the left and out of the way, but right then _another_ fireball appeared, heading straight for her.

 _What!?_ Kame barely had time to register as the first fireball poofed out of existence- _An illusory fireball, and then another real one after the target dodges the first one._ Haku was caught in the blast of flame and cried out in pain as the fire enveloped her. When the smoke cleared, she was diving down towards the water and managed to extinguish herself by rolling through it, coming out of the roll in a ready position. However, her stance couldn't hide the fact that she had burns on her stomach, thighs, and forearms, and was shaking slightly from pain.

Naruko sauntered out of the forest twirling a kunai. "Come on, is that really it? You're right, Kame _is_ stronger than you if that's all you-" She was cut off as Haku came charging forward towards her, moving in an arc that kept the dark-haired girl's back to the treeline. "Oh, you still got some fight left in you… but you won't after _this_!" She moved forward to meet Haku in taijutsu, swinging the kunai forward towards her, but Haku wasn't dodging at all…

In fact, the Sand girl simply tore right through Naruko like she wasn't there- which, she wasn't. The illusion fell apart and Haku went straight into the trees, forcing Naruko to leap out towards the river. She landed, grimaced, and then ran through the handsigns for the Fireball Jutsu- but froze up and actually yelped in pain, shuddering violently. It wasn't until Kame heard the crackle of electricity that he realized what had happened.

Haku charged again, now from the patch of river that disappeared into the forest. Lightning crackled around her, more viciously than he'd seen it ever before (perhaps due to the first and second breaths), and conducted through the river to keep Naruko off-balance. Naruko was immobilized, unable to properly respond, and as Haku charged her she desperately reached for her weapon- but not in time, and Haku's enhanced fist struck her straight to the gut and sent her flying up into the air. The purple-haired girl blurred up next to her and spun, beginning the taijutsu move that had put down two other genin opponents. "Hidden Lightning Devil!"

Unable to substitute out, Naruko bore the full brunt of the first strike. Kame saw her pounded hard by a lightning-enhanced leg and sent flying downwards- but something went wrong. A blast of orange chakra and killing intent sent Haku darting back, and instead of completing the finisher technique she fell back and watched as Naruko landed controlledly. _That's not…_ Naruko narrowed her eyes in rage and the ground around her began to fragment apart. _How is she…_ "You're the problem with the ninja world. Haku, you're the epitome of weakness being carried forward by the strength around it, and I _will not lose to you_!"

 _What is this power?_ She strode forward faster and faster, crumbling the ground underneath her feet, and the orange chakra billowed off of her violently. _Is she… a jinchuriki? But how!?_ Her voice was chillingly calm even as she closed the gap with powerful strides: "So this is the power of the ninetails… you don't stand a chance now…"

Haku, instead of fleeing, actually charged as well, shouting her own threat. "Third Activation: Breath of Speed! Ninetails or not, you won't-"

Then she stopped moving, and the ninetails chakra vanished, as did the cracks in the ground and all of the oppressive killing intent. Naruko was staring straight at her, smirking as she walked up. "You fell for my genjutsu, and then you looked into my eyes. Now, how about a taste of another one!" _She can make illusions convincing enough to have killing intent and leaving cracks in the ground? This is bad, Haku lost her lightning stance when she got immobilized…_ Naruko reached forward and grabbed Haku's arm, then backed away. "Shadow Clone Jutsu! Substitution Jutsu!" She used the two jutsu in combination to get back across the arena in the nick of time as she apparently blinked and Haku regained her ability to move.

However, despite having the purple skin and aura of the third breath still active, something was wrong with her- she was moving far slower than the was before, still faster than a normal human but nowhere near where she'd been. Naruko was almost amused as she kept up the distance between them far more easily, even throwing out a shuriken that Haku barely dodged. "This genjutsu requires touch but speeds up the target's perception of time. Not that you can hear me, with your ears blocked up, but I think the crowd should know why you're moving like a slug." She threw another two shuriken, and Haku reacted a split-second too late, getting clipped by the metal projectiles.

"Now, I haven't used these guys since the tournament started and they'll get cranky if I don't use them at least once, so…" She bit her thumb, made a few signs, and then slammed her hand to the ground. "Summoning Jutsu!" A huge cloud of smoke billowed out into the air before her, and then cleared to reveal a massive purple snake, thicker than a tree trunk and hundreds of feet long.

"Naruko-sama, how may I be of service?" it hissed in a surprisingly human voice.

"Nagaida, we have to crush this genin in order for me to win the chunin exams." Naruko was standing on its head, pointing at Haku. "She's already slowed down by my genjutsu, so this should be easy."

"Yes, Naruko-sama…" The snake's head rose into the air slowly, in the controlled manner of predators that have already narrowed down their prey. Haku lowered herself into a defensive stance, but she was clearly still affected by the slowing genjutsu and was unlikely to be able to dodge the snake's attack. After a brief moment of stillness, Nagaida's head shot forward, but moments before its attack landed Haku jumped _forward_ towards it.

Its jaws snapped shut, but before it could swallow or move back, it shuddered violently. "What is-" Naruko was unable to finish her question as she was knocked backwards when Nagaida's jaws flew open and, in a crunch of shattered bone, Haku punched open its fangs and stepped out. She was bleeding heavily from one leg and covered in the snake's saliva, but alive and moving with her full speed again. _That's clever,_ Kame thought, _she moved forward into the bite to minimize the damage and then the pain of having her leg bitten shook her out of the disabling genjutsu._

Nagaida shuddered as it rose back up into the air, but Haku didn't let it go far. She dashed forward and slammed a fist directly into the snake's stomach, then when it bent over she landed an uppercut into its jaw that sent another couple of bone fragments flying from its mouth. The huge snake visibly wavered and then wordlessly disappeared in a puff of smoke, presumably returning to the Ryuchi Cave.

Naruko growled as she landed, throwing a fireball at Haku that was easily evaded. Haku closed the distance and swung a fist forward so quickly that she seemed to simply blink up next to the tree that the Uchiha was next to and shatter it instantly. _Naruko can't fight her with taijutsu in this state. One solid hit, and it's over_. Naruko rolled backwards and made a few signs, but as she came up into a crouch Haku was already standing behind her and grabbed her by the back of her clothing.

She turned with the opponent in hand and then threw her up into the air, dashing up to join her. _Is this it? Sureki got put down by this move in a third gate state, so if she hits Naruko with the Hidden Devil I think she's done for._ Haku spun, swung out a leg, and then seemed to falter and weakly launched Naruko towards the ground and didn't finish the combo. _Oh, no…_ Kame could see the smoke that most chakra constructs left behind drifting off of her skin. _Did she seriously run out now?_

Still, Naruko hit the earth _hard_ and Haku landed beside her and swung out a leg, catching the Leaf girl in the midriff even as her muscles shrank and her skin lost color. Naruko went flying and a last-minute Wind Cushion Jutsu was barely enough to soften her impact against the arena wall. Haku completely lost her aura, now standing weakly with both arms hanging at her sides. The burns that Kame had briefly forgotten were now ugly and raw, and the cuts she'd taken over the course of the match were bloodied. _She looks so tired… but, if Naruko doesn't-_

As if to spit in his face, Naruko chose to stand up at that moment, looking equally hurt after significantly less hits. The way she was favoring one side reminded Kame of his own stance after breaking a rib on his first mission, and she coughed a blood spatter onto her shirtfront. Glancing down at the dark red stain on the light red clothing, the Leaf kunoichi laughed. "Huh, out of everyone in the tournament, the jutsu-less one ends up being the only person to draw my blood. Still…" She flicked her eyes up to Haku, who appeared to also be looking at the bloodstain. "This match is over. Sharingan Secret Art: Blood Vengeance."

Haku froze up. _What? Does she have another line of defense?_ Kame rocked backwards in shock. _Another ace in the hole that she held in reserve this whole time!? I've never heard of that jutsu before…_ Naruko sagged backwards to lean on the wall. "You looked at my blood, which is enough to catch you in this genjutsu I invented. Now, have fun running through all your negative memories, starting with the bad ones and getting worse and worse until you've re-experienced all the pain in your life."

 _She's… she's not ending the match…_ Kame growled in anger, tightening his hands on the railing. _This girl is putting Haku through mental torment when she could just end it here and now._ _This is just like what happened to… wait…_ He turned to Miriki, eyes desperate, but the Kosuki boy was already staring out towards the field with Hatogan active. However, after a few seconds of nothing, he swore and shook his head. "I can't. I think they put a barrier in place between the matches, because I can't get a lock on Haku. Maybe if they put it over the stands as well, Ginsenbo wouldn't have been able to…" he trailed off.

 _Haku…_ Kame looked towards the field in helpless horror. His teammate had dropped to her knees, gazing up into nothingness and not moving. _What are you seeing? The townspeople hating you? Tetsute and Rakuyo-_ "Mother… Father…" Haku's voice, while weak, drifted over just loud enough for Kame to hear. _What!? Gaara said she had no memories… Wait, Naruko said that this jutsu dragged out even memories that people had repressed. Is she seeing when her clan was wiped out?_

Kame remembered, for some reason, Sureki's attempted words earlier that day. _He said he saw Gaara's chakra color, and then made a non-sequitur transition to Haku's seal… wait…_ Kankuro had never left the little viewing area, and Kame whirled around to face the older man. "Kankuro," he said, forgoing the 'Master' title in his intensity, "tell me the truth. Was it Gaara who destroyed Haku's chakra network?"

Kankuro's face hardened. "I can't tell-"

"I don't care if it's an S-class secret, just answer me!" Kame's eyes blazed at the thought of the only person who'd watched over Haku at all being the same one who destroyed her dreams.

Kankuro took a deep breath, glancing around at everyone near them, before grunting in submission and nodding. "Yes."

Part of Kame reeled at the news, but before he could let himself succumb to the thoughts racing through his mind he forced himself to ask again. "Then was Gaara also the one who blocked off her memories?"

"Yes." Kankuro's tone got more aggressive, as though he was gearing up to defend his brother.

Kame started to ask again, but a sudden wave of killing intent from the arena caused him to flinch and turn to see what was happening. Haku was on her knees, head in her hands, with the cloth over her shoulder blades ripped open and revealing a complex sealing mark that was glowing slightly and emitting a dark mist. _Is this… the tentail's power? But how could… is her rage weakening the seal?_

In his morbid curiosity, though, one more question entered his mind and he asked it before he could think about the repercussions. "Did the Hidden Sand kill her family?"

Kankuro's face lost its defensiveness, and turned somber. "I can't..."

"Yes, you can- no, you _have_ to." Kame wasn't going to take no for an answer.

"Kame, you don't want to know, trust me on this." Kankuro wore an expression of helpless regret.

"Look, I'm pretty sure I already know the answer from how dodgy you're being, but I'm gonna ask one more time." Kame felt his faith in the Hidden Sand, already shaken loose by a number of recent revelations, waver in the balance. "Did. The. Sand. Wipe. Out. Haku's. Clan?" After a long, long silence, Kankuro responded without meeting his eyes.

"No, we didn't wipe her clan out. _She_ did."

As the words left his mouth, Haku started a scream that turned into an unearthly wail, and Kame felt the killing intent multiply until he was all but paralyzed. He forced an unresponsive neck to turn and look at the battlefield, where Haku was no longer… Haku. She was standing on two crouched legs, her arms held defensively and ending in long, clawed hands. Her entire body was cloaked in purple chakra and the very air itself around her seemed to be warping inwards and growing darker. Her face was unrecognizable through the swirling chakra, but on top of the purple mass sat a single line that looked like a closed eye. Behind her, there were two tails slowly floating in the air, with a third one emerging to join them.

 _Is that really Haku?_ _Is she still in there, or does the tentails have control?_ The tormented sound quieted to a stop, leaving the arena strangely quiet… and then the eye opened, revealing a red circle that turned towards Naruko.

Then, faster than she'd been before, faster than Kame could see, the creature that Haku had become was standing before Naruko and swinging an arm forward. Proctor Kenken somehow warped the weakened Uchiha over to him, shouting, "Everyone, please leave the arena in a calm and orderly fashion!" The crowd murmured and then roared, a mass exodus of people fleeing the monstrosity in the ring.

Haku's swing had hit the wall and destroyed a three-meter-wide chunk of it, with more crumbling away by the second. She turned around and made another screeching noise, then flashed forward towards the two other shinobi left in the arena. "Earth Style: Catapult Launch Jutsu!" Kenken yelled, and he and Naruko were sent flying just before Haku's next strike created a barren crater out of where they'd been standing. _Can I call her Haku, anymore? She's given in completely to the tentails…_

The tentails opened a mouth gap in its face and roared, but the chakra that built up there seemed to just dissipate instead of blasting forward. This only made it _more_ angry, but by then several shinobi of various villages were coming down into the ring to join in the efforts to subdue it. It turned slowly, seemingly taking in the various shinobi and jutsu being mobilized, and then disappeared from sight and reappeared behind the mid-air Kenken. The leaf jonin threw Naruko towards the stands at the last minute, trying to shield himself from the attack that was coming-

But instead of following through, the tentails turned to track Naruko with its one eye and then blinked over beside her. _One attack from that thing, and she's done for… I have to help… but what if Haku's still in there and I hurt her?_ Kame remained frozen in place, but others didn't. Kakuzen made a bridge of wood leading up to the stands, which Gunaji and Sagino ran up. The tentails raised its arm to swing at Naruko, but Gunaji arrived to grab and move her while Sagino took on a stone shell and braced to block the blow.

But as soon as the rocky defense appeared, it simply faded away when the tentails opened its mouth wide and inhaled. Sagino seemed to start to collapse as a stream of blueish chakra was yanked from her into the tentails' body, but before she could fall over the arm swung and landed a brutal hit directly to her side. Her body was sent hurtling out into the arena, but Kame could tell she was dead from way her body was twisted and the sheer amount of blood. The shock of watching someone he knew executed so mercilessly forced the emotions out of his mind and left only a strangely calm and logical voice.

 _Sagino is dead,_ he thought. _Haku is lost somewhere inside of that tentails form, which none of us genin stand a chance against._ He watched impassively as the genin up in the stands came running or falling down to the arena floor, watched Gunaji collapse over his dead sister's body. Watched Naruko stumble among them and then twist in fear as the tentails landed beside their group, the sheer force of its arrival knocking them back. Kakuzen forcibly pulled Gunaji back away from the monster. _Good plan,_ Kame contemplated, _there's no way that any of the genin here stand a chance against Haku in this state_. _Maybe some of the jonin, and most likely the Kage, are our best hope. Judging from that roar earlier, the tentails can't use mass area attacks. Numbers could work… no, weaker ninja grouping up won't help thin, since jutsu seem to be ineffective. The Kage need to get involved._

For the moment, they seemed to be still in their box for some reason. The gathered jonin, mostly leaf but a scattering of members from other villages, engaged on the tentails, raining projectile attacks upon it. The hail of kunai and shuriken seemed to actually hit it, eliciting a roar of anger, but then all the attacks in the air and any shinobi too close to the tentails were knocked back as a wave of dark energy rolled outward. _Huh, there's four tails now,_ Kame thought. _That's probably not good._

As the fourth tail emerged, the tentails emitted a thick black mist, blocking any sight of it. The unnatural fog swirled around but stayed in that central area, with none of the ninja willing to approach it… and then, a patch of the fog whisked outwards, deceptively peaceful, as a dark form tore out from the cloud and blurred into visibility in a spot occupied by one of the ninja and clutching said ninja in a huge claw.

Kame, still in his stunned state, could only mentally state facts. _It's larger now, maybe ten feet tall, but it's hard to tell when it's hunched over the way it is. The arms are longer, as long as the body, and the hands are stretched out into claws- those are probably deadly. There's no aura anymore, just a dark form of black and purple with the one red eye. Haku's completely gone, isn't she?_

The man trapped in its claws screamed and struggled, and a few ninjutsu were fired off against the tentails, but each one in turn was simply swallowed up into its maw. It held out the arm, and the captured shinobi's chakra seemed to drain out of him, swirling up his body and into the tentails' clawed hand. _I remember when I looked into tailed beasts… they were said to be heartless monsters, but later proved to have personalities. That's why villages don't hunt and imprison them anymore, instead allowing them to choose their jinchurikis. However… whatever Haku has become, it doesn't seem to have any objective other than killing._

The man's cries of pain choked off and he slumped in the tentails' grip. It dropped him onto the earth of the arena, then stomped down where his body lay- but he was gone, whisked away by a patch of sand. _Oh, looks like the Kage are finally entering the fray._ He remembered the theoretical battles and matchups he'd enjoyed setting up as a child. _The Raikage, Hokage, Kazekage, and Tanikage against the tentails jinchuriki. Who will win?_

"Haku! Stop this, now!" Gaara had the tone of an angry parent, not the authoritative voice of a Kazekage. "You have to reassert control over the tentails, before it's too late!" The tentails tilted its head confusedly, then thrust an open palm forward… but nothing happened. In a small bit of humor, it turned to stare at its hand, shook it a few times, and then thrust it forth… but again, nothing happened. _Is it trying to use some sort of jutsu?_

Gaara pushed two open palms to the earth, turning it to sand, and then straightened up as platforms of the newly made sand lifted all the shinobi combatants out of the arena. With all the forms of people rising up, it was a stark contrast to see two ninja leaping _down_ onto the ground- Shira and Rock Lee had decided to attack.

In quick succession, they opened up to the sixth gate and fifth breath and engaged, battering the tentails back. Its huge, devastating swings were uselessly slow and easy to dodge, and it was unable to consume the chakra of the two jonin because there wasn't any. _Huh,_ Kame thought, _I guess it would be ironic if the tentails ended up losing to two taijutsu users…_ but their initial assault wasn't indicative of the outcome. As they forced it further and further back, the tentails screeched and then inhaled towards them. Their chakra-enhanced bodies lost much of their strength, and as the last vestiges of their energy was taken away, they slowed significantly and were forced to try to dodge backwards.

However, Shira wasn't quite fast enough, and the tentails shot forward and swung forward. _No... Shira..._ Millimeters away from the airborne man, the claw stopped its swing and the creature seemed to hesitate. _Is that… Haku? Could she be trying to regain control?_

Gaara swept in, lifting the two taijutsu users out of the arena like everyone else and tossing a few harassment attacks of sand. "Haku! You have to snap out of it! I'm sorry about your family, and I can never apologize enough for what I did to-" He had to stop talking and drop straight down as the tentails' fist blasted into the space where his head had occupied, going straight through his rock-hard sand shield.

It screeched as it fell down after him, smashing into the ground hard enough to throw up a huge cloud of dust. When the haze cleared, the tentails, now with a fifth tail extended, seemed to open its mouth wide and inhale into the air. All of the Kazekage's sand lost its power and streams of blue chakra funneled into the tentails' mouth, including a thick one that came from Gaara's chest. _It's getting stronger with each succesive tail,_ Kame noted.

When Gaara staggered backwards and then attempted to reconnect with the sand, but in the moment of vulnerability as he bent over to touch the ground the tentails was already upon him. Gaara threw up a shield of sand that was ineffective, and the huge claw swung straight into his body, crushing his midsection almost completely. Somehow, the sight of the monster killing Gaara snapped Kame out of the haze he'd been thrust into after watching Sagino's death, and he felt… too many intense emotions to keep track. Terror _of_ Haku, terror _for_ Haku, rage towards the Kazekage, fear for the Kazekage…

But the claw kept going all the way through Gaara's body, and then he crumbled into sand. _A sand clone!_ Hope returned to Kame's heart as the real Gaara floated down from the stands, with Naruto and Sasuke to his sides. The Raikage and Tanikage were nowhere to be seen, but… with Naruto, Sasuke, and Gaara's efforts combined, the tentails stood no chance. _Haku stands no chance,_ Kame realized. _That's her in there. They might kill her to protect the Leaf village._

A glimmer of light brought his eyes back down to the field, where the tentails had raised an arm towards its three opponents. The space before its open palm had a tiny, yet incredibly bright light in it, which grew slightly with each second until it was in a line- no, a crack. _Is… the seal breaking?_ The crack opened wider and wider, until there was a veritable spiderweb of glowing lines, and then…

The space simply exploded, and a massive burst of pure power, light and heat beyond anything Kame had ever seen, blazed into existence in a cone going upwards. _How… the tentails is so powerful… wait, Gaara!_ That attack had been aimed to hit where the three shinobi were standing, and as the blast of energy had completely destroyed a huge chunk of the arena. A small wisp of smoke… _that's chakra-construct smoke,_ Kame realized. _They were shadow clones!?_

"I can't believe that you hid this from me, Gaara." Naruto's voice came from the high and off to the left of the arena. When Kame looked up, he saw the Seventh Hokage standing at the edge of the stands, looking down at the tentails. He glowed with orange energy, a spinning orb of chakra held in his right hand.

"I can't believe I never found it out." Sasuke said, opposite to his old rival and standing off to the right. He had rinnegan out in full force and chidori crackling.

"I'm sorry." Gaara floated high above them. "But right now, the tentails is here in the leaf, and five tails out already… we can't let this go on." He waved a hand and the sand on the arena floor shifted, coming in to pile around the tentails' legs. "Solid Sand!" Kame, who'd grown up in the desert, recognized the sand becoming sandstone and hardening. The tentails shifted a little bit, obviously without much effort, but the sand held firm. "Can you two end... can..." Gaara trailed off. "We can't let her go any further, but... try not to kill her."

"Agreed." Naruto orange chakra blazed bright as he and Sasuke dropped into charging stances. In a burst of speed, the two ninja darted down their respective walls, seemingly confusing the tentails. It crouched in the same spot as they approached rapidly. _But they intend to attack it with ninjutsu? Why…_ Kame noticed that they held their jutsu behind them, keeping their bodies between their weapons and the tentails. _So far, this thing has only shown the ability to consume things directly in front of it, and even then only in a small area, so if they only bring the offensive jutsu around at the last moment, then maybe…_

They neared it, legendary offensive jutsu coming from both sides, and Kame involuntarily twitched forward in… Fear? Anticipation? But as they flashed in the final few meters, he felt only remorse for the mistakes he'd made that had landed Haku in this mess.

"Chidori!"

"Rasenshuriken!"

After a flash of light that forced Kame to look away, the arena was left completely silent. He turned back slowly, afraid of the image of Haku's lifeless body being left there between the two heroes of his childhood.

What he actually saw somehow filled him with even more horror than that. That sardonic, emotionless corner of his mind chuckled a little bit at the fact that he couldn't have been more wrong. A seven-tailed monstrosity stood between the two ninja, five meters tall and with massive hands reaching out with fingers at least a foot long. All traces of sage mode, tailed beast mode, and rinnegan were gone, leaving the two men standing there and looking far older and weaker than Kame could ever have imagined seeing them.

Then the tentails' hands shot out, securing Naruto and Sasuke, and it disappeared, cracking the ground where it had stood. For a few seconds, Kame frantically scanned for any sign, and then some sixth sense told him to look up. There he saw the monster spiraling downwards, Naruto and Sasuke still clutched in its hands in a move strangely similar to the Lee clan's Lotus. Its two opponents were either unconscious or completely drained of chakra, because they didn't seem to be moving or resisting at all even as they hurtled downwards in a move that Kame was afraid would kill them.

The tentails spun faster and faster, dropping at lightning speed, and then crushed its two immobile foes headfirst into the ground, blasting out a huge cloud of earth and dust. The haze cleared to reveal a crater with the Hokage and Uchiha clan head both lying on the ground, dashing Kame's last hope that they were shadow clones. _If THEY couldn't beat it, then…_ Kame froze as the single red eye snapped up to look directly at him. _I'm dead._

But before he could find out whether his prediction would have come true, a flash of green heralded the the Tanikage jumping in from above and falling through the air just behind the tentails. Before it could turn, the man shouted, "Domination!" and slammed an open palm forward. Without ceremony, glowing chakra, or any effects, every trace of the tentails simply disappeared, and Haku fell to the ground battered and unconscious.

 _What... how is anyone that powerful..._

The Tanikage straightened up, glancing down at Haku, and then simply walked off.


	22. Arc 2 Vol 12: An Awful Choice

**(A/N) Well, looks like they completely obliterated Orochimaru's character in Boruto, so the next couple arcs are gonna have to be rewritten. Wheeeee.**

 **Ninja Profile: Mujina Yaranoko**

Ninjutsu: B  
Genjutsu: B  
Taijutsu: A  
Specialties: Assassinations, Silent Kill, Mercilessness

Description: Bearing a solid resemblance to the White Fang of the Leaf, Mujina is a middle-aged man with a head of white hair and blue eyes. He stands ever-cautious and flinches at sudden sounds or movements even in casual settings. His personality is typically rough towards everyone, sparing little time for social pleasantries.

Origin: Mujina was raised an orphan of the Fourth Shinobi World War in the Hidden Cloud, and carried the scars of seeing his family killed during it. He excelled through the academy and rose to jonin very quickly thanks to his extreme dedication and willingness to use any means necessary. Completing S-class assassination missions successfully and regularly earned him an 'attack on sight' spot in bingo books around the world. His grim focus and tenacity mean that, if he is given a mission to kill someone, there is little that person can do save pray.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

"I say we execute the girl now." Despite the brutal words coming from his mouth, the Fifth Raikage was lying back in his chair and spoke in a mellow voice. "She's clearly unstable, and we can't just sedate her forever."

Deihaka coughed a few times from his position standing behind Gaara. They were at a meeting between the four Kage who had been present for the final stage of the chunin exams. _Although… there are a lot of extra people here…_ Kame guessed that Gaara had asked to bring along Deihaka and Kame to speak their part, but old habits died hard and the other Kage got suspicious. They must have reached a resolution where each Kage was allowed to bring along exactly one genin and one jonin, a ridiculous situation that ended up with quite a few unnecessary people crowding the room.

Naruto sat in his chair, Naruko to his right and Kenken to his left. Darui had brought Zandeina and another jonin named Mujina that Kame didn't recognize. Finally, the Tanikage had brought along a devastated-looking Gunaji and Senshiko, filling out the twelve total people arranged around the meeting table. When nobody objected, Deihaka responded to the Raikage's statement. "Haku was put through a genjutsu that unsealed memories that she didn't even know she had. She essentially experienced killing her entire clan for the first time- and I defy any of you to tell me that at age fourteen you'd be okay after that."

Darui wasn't backing down. "Look, I understand that you're worried about losing your second jinchuriki. Shukaku is the weakest of the biju and your village is the most secluded, so the Sand has historically been the weakest Hidden Village-"

"Hey!" Deihaka interjected annoyedly.

"Okay, the weakest of the five _important_ Hidden Villages-"

"Hey!" Now it was Senshiko's turn to interject.

The Raikage grimaced. "Okay, okay. Now that the Cloud, Stone and Mist have two jinchuriki each I understand that you feel a rush to gain your own strength, but creating a monstrosity like her…"

Gaara grunted in annoyance. "We didn't create her." _So at least he was telling the truth about that,_ Kame thought cynically. "She arrived at our village terrified and alone, with the tentails' power seeping out of her. I…" he looked down at the table, voice finally getting some emotion. "In the decision in my life that I've agonized the most over, I decided to completely and irreversibly seal away her chakra network, as well as her memories of her clan."

Naruto frowned. "Why didn't you train her instead of destroying her chakra network? Her power wouldn't have been-"

"Because of this very situation!" Gaara interrupted his old friend with a frustrated tone. "I knew that if I publicly had and trained a tentails jinchuriki, the other Kage- you all- would have protested and fought and I'd end up in this exact meeting trying to save her from being murdered in the name of 'peace'."

 _At least the Raikage is honest enough to not deny it,_ Kame thought. Naruto was also wearing a troubled look, while the Tanikage was completely unreadable behind his large hat and cloth face-cover with small eyeholes. However, Gunaji broke the silence without the same indecision present on many of the older shinobi at the table: "That doesn't matter now! My sister is dead because Haku is a dangerous, broken weapon. If she went on a mission and that happened, who would protect the civilians?"

Zandeina nodded. "She has no control over it."

Surprisingly, it was Naruko who spoke in support of Haku. "Neither Naruto nor Gaara had any control over their tailed beasts at first, and now they're Kage. Can't we just… I don't know, train her?" _Why is she doing this?_ Kame was taken aback by the previously confrontational Naruko's support for Haku. _What does she have to gain from it?_ "My grandfather, the Seventh Hokage, managed to befriend _all_ of the tailed beasts. I'm sure that he could train Haku to manage the tentails." _Oh, so that's her game. She wants a powerful jinchuriki for the Hidden Leaf._

"Absolutely not." The Raikage crossed his arms. "I will not allow the Leaf to have the ninetails _and_ the tentails within its walls."

The Tanikage sounded more curious than anything when he finally spoke. "Then who do you propose should keep her?"

Kame couldn't take it anymore. "Why are you all talking about her like she's property to be owned and bargained for? She's my friend, a shinobi with her own hopes and dreams, and for you all to…" He trailed off, highly aware of the fact that most of the room's occupants were staring at him.

Deihaka smoothly picked up where he'd left off. "I think what my genin is driving at is that she has spent a large part of her life in the Hidden Sand and should remain there."

The Tanikage cocked his head. "I actually propose that she return to the Village Hidden in the Valleys." This statement was met with several noises of confusion and mostly just blank looks. "Now, hear me out: We are a minor village with no standing feuds with any of the Five Great Shinobi Villages, but an ironclad defensive record that proves we can keep her safe from those who prize her. You are all from villages with long, sordid histories filled with war and hate, and I don't think you can be trusted to not weaponize a tentails jinchuriki with the Yorutsume kekkegenkai."

Naruto and Darui both flinched back, visibly surprised by the news about Haku's clan. After that, the meeting dragged for nearly an hour of the same, repetitive crap: the Kage doing their best to politically claim Haku, the genin whining about their feuds with her, and the jonin staying mostly out of it. By the end of it, there was clearly no way for the villages to reach a conclusion, and the conversation took a new turn:

"We have to just execute her. None of the villages can have her, and if she's left to wander alone she'll get snatched up by either a village or a missing-ninja." The Raikage delivered the statement in a matter-of-fact voice.

"She doesn't deserve to die, and if-" Gaara crossed his arms.

"Well, neither did Sagino!" Gunaji exploded angrily, "and neither do Naruto or Sasuke, but that monster would have killed them both."

Gaara turned towards the Valley genin apologetically. " _I_ wanted to kill everyone around me, but Naruto showed me the light. In time, I was even able to bond with my tailed beast, and I want Haku to-"

Naruto grunted uncomfortably. "Gaara, I…" he trailed off, putting an arm behind his head. "I've spoken with the tailed beasts, and they all have minds and feelings; they can be befriended. But the ten-tails… it's not like them. It's a hungry force of nature that wants nothing other than to consume all of the chakra in the world."

Gaara turned his head quickly towards Naruto. "But up until yesterday, she wasn't a problem. If we can just-"

Now it was the Tanikage's turn to interrupt. "If it happened once, it can happen again- in fact, at the mere sight of those memories, she broke. The memory erasure jutsu only works to block off _all_ of a person's memories, so will you just erase her entire life up until this point? Or are you telling me that you expect her to live every day from now on with those same memories in her mind and not lose control."

Gaara, beleaguered, moved once more to face the Tanikage. "We will find a way. I won't allow an innocent genin to be executed. Haku has done-"

Gunaji spoke over him _again_. "She killed my sister!"

The Kazekage opened his mouth to reply, but closed it. Finally, he seemed to decide on how to respond. "It was the tentails that killed your sister. Haku is an innocent girl whose only crime was being born to the wrong parents at the wrong time."

"Like so many other dead in the shinobi world." The jonin beside the Raikage spoke in a somber tone. "We've finally found a hard-won peace, and I don't think the life of one girl is any reason to give it up."

The Tanikage nodded wisely. "A small price to pay."

"But there doesn't have to be a price!" Kame was completely flabbergasted at the level of sheer stubbornness of the ninja before him. "Haku doesn't need to be owned, and she doesn't need to be murdered! So what if one village is stronger than the others? Can't you all just sit down at this table and agree not to attack each other!?"

The grim Cloud jonin chuckled. "Your lack of understanding is stark. Such agreements have been made before, and they always fall apart. The next generation may grow further apart, and then their successors will lose the bonds completely. What then? With no friendship, what stops shinobi from setting upon each other with every weapon they have?"

No one answered, so the man continued. "The balance of power must be maintained, even with those you dislike, because without it we risk repeating the mistakes of all those who came before us."

Naruto seemed particularly out of it after that speech. _His answer to the question of how to change the shinobi world was friendship and forgiveness… but friendship and forgiveness aren't enough._ Kame could see his indecision plain on his features.

The Tanikage broke the ensuing silence. "We've deliberated enough. Let's vote." _No…_ Kame knew what was coming, but couldn't stop it. "All in favor of ending Haku's life?" Gunaji's hand shot straight up into the air, but at Senshiko's glare he dropped it. "All _Kage_ in favor of ending Haku's life?"

The Raikage and Tanikage both raised their hands. _Wait, so it's a tie. Where do we go from…_ Kame's thoughts ground to a halt as Naruto's hand slowly drifted up into the air. _No, Naruto… you were supposed to… I thought…_ Kame's mental images of the perfect, ever-smiling bastion of good in the shinobi world shattered into a thousand pieces. _Why did I look up to this? Willing to execute someone to maintain a 'power balance'?_ Stories of Naruto that had filled his childhood and shaped his character seemed so far from the imperfect man sitting before him. _Why is the world- why are people like this?_

"Then it's decided. We'll carry out the..." Kame didn't hear the rest because he stormed out of the room, completely disgusted with every person inside it. He was so angry that as he left the Hokage's tower and leaped to a nearby rooftop, he completely failed to notice the man standing on it, waiting for him.

"Hello there, Kame." A raspy, drawn-out voice sounded out from behind him, and he whirled around to see a man dressed in a yellow and green robe with a huge purple rope tied around his waist. As the man strode closer, Kame got a better look at his pale-white skin, his slit-pupiled eyes, and long, black hair.

 _I know this man. I've read his name a hundred times._ "Orochimaru." _Honestly, I should probably either be calling ANBU or running away, but… I'm in a strange state right now. Plus, if he wanted me dead I'd probably be dead already._ Kame remembered all too well the incident three years ago, where the newly-legitimate Hidden Sound had been wiped out completely in a betrayal by Orochimaru- their own Kage."How and why are you inside this village? And why do you know my name?"

Orochimaru's face didn't change, smiling the same dead grin. "This is peacetime, the village's borders may as well be wide open for all the Leaf is defending them. I'm in here to take something I want, and I know your name because one of my underlings told me all about you."

 _Sankuryu._ "Why are you speaking to me?"

"Because I have a… proposition… for you." The Sannin's voice fluctuated around the word 'proposition'. _Whatever it is, it's going to come at a terrible cost,_ Kame reminded himself. _The history books are littered with people that Orochimaru has used up and left behind._ "I have an enemy that has a vested interest in obtaining the Yorutsume girl; therefore I have a vested interest in recruiting her, and you, to serve under me."

Kame didn't respond and Orochimaru kept speaking. "She is unique, of course, but from what I've seen so are you." _What? I don't have any kekkegenkai, and my family line isn't particularly impressive… what is he talking about?_ "You chafe under the restrictions of the shinobi system, don't you? You see the people walking around you and curse them for their hypocrisy and lies."

 _I do…_ Kame snapped himself out of the strangely hypnotic effect of Orochimaru's voice. "I do, but I think my reasons and yours are very different."

"Ah, but our goals are the same- to get the girl out of this village and out from the shinobi system." Orochimaru paused. "She is… important to you, and important to me as well."

 _Oh, no… does he want her body as…?_ Feeling unusually bold, Kame responded to the Sannin's unspoken meaning. "If you want Haku's body, the answer is already-"

"No, I don't want her body. That accursed seal has mangled her chakra points beyond repair. A pity, because the thought of having both the tentails _and_ Yorutsume kekkegenkai is certainly… tantalizing…" He licked his lips with an inhumanly long tongue. "But no, my objectives are more mundane than you assume. I know that the four Kage have sentenced her to die tonight." _I was there when they did it, but…_ Kame still winced hearing it out loud.

"I see a powerful, unique ninja who has been cast out by the ninja world, and has nowhere to go." _He's talking about Haku._ "You call her a friend, yes?" He didn't wait for Kame to answer. "I think that your friendship will drive you to save her, even if it means losing your own status as a Sand Shinobi."

Kame's mind raced, processing this new path. _He's asking me to betray my village. I can't…_ his gut instinct was violent and negative, a product of the mindset pushed onto every single academy student. To betray the village wasn't just evil, wasn't _bad_ , it was just something that was never to be done, something unthinkable. _I can't do it._ "I won't…"

His voice failed him as his mind dragged him back to the interrogation after his first mission. _Deep down, I don't love the Sand… I honestly answered that I cared more about Haku than them. Can I really lie to myself any longer?_ He opened his mouth, but stopped when he realized that he honestly didn't know which answer he'd give. _Haku, or the Sand? All my dreams of becoming a legendary, well-respected shinobi, or…_ Kame remembered another thought from that night at the interrogation chamber. _Loyalty to morals, or loyalty to village? Which one do the great-_

Then he thought of the decisions three Kage had made prior that very night, and realized that perhaps following in the footsteps of great shinobi wasn't the path he wanted to walk. A final memory entered his mind, of his promise to Gaara: 'I swear to save Haku.'

"I'll do it." He looked into the eyes of Orochimaru. "I'll abandon the ninja villages if it means I can save Haku."

"Excellent…" Orochimaru's eyes brightened up with a strangely _possessive_ glimmer. "The hospital is better-guarded than the gates, but this is the Hidden Leaf- if you walk in with stories about wanting to see your 'friend' one more time, they'll yield." Orochimaru had a strange way of saying the word 'friend', as though it were from another language and he had to concentrate on his pronunciation. He held out a hand with two small white squares stacked atop one another. "These two pieces of paper are marked with a reverse-summoning jutsu. Five seconds after they are split apart, the people touching them will be teleported out of the Leaf."

Kame nodded, keeping those instructions in his head. Now that he'd chosen his course, he retreated into his impassive state of mind. Things were much easier to deal with when he could simply ignore all the emotionally-wrought indecisiveness. _Split the pieces of paper apart, hold one and touch the other one to Haku within five seconds. Wait…_ "Orochimaru, how do I know that these tags aren't a trap?"

The man was already gone. _I guess… if I don't do it, Haku is definitely dead. But if I do go through with it, there's still a chance._ Kame went to the hospital to pack his things, thankfully avoiding running into anyone he knew, then headed straight for the hospital in a haze. _I won't let Haku die._ There were several guards in the lobby and scattered around the hospital, but evidently they hadn't been ordered to stop random Suna genin. However, as he asked for Haku's room number, the woman at the front desk gave him a suspicious look.

"Please, ma'am… she's my teammate, and I just want to see her…" Kame banked on the woman either not knowing about the execution, or assuming that _he_ didn't and taking pity on him. He didn't know which one it turned out to be, but it didn't matter- she gave him the number and he moved on.

After descending to a sub-level without anyone challenging him and making it to the mouth of the correct hallway, the first roadblock appeared: two leaf chunin who stood in his path. "Sorry, kid, but I think you got turned around- wait, you're a Suna kid."

Kame scanned the two of them; while only chunin-rank they were fairly old for shinobi. He opted to play into their expectations and act like an inexperienced kid, making a pleading face and fiddling nervously with his hands. "Oh, sorry… I just, wanted to say goodbye, you know? We're leaving tonight, but sensei said that Haku would have to stay behind to get treated…" _This story also explains why I have a packed bag._

The two chunin shared a look of 'oh, boy…'. Kame knew how they'd think: they didn't want to have to break the news to the oblivious child, and their job was to watch for intruders. Some kid who didn't even know that the execution was going to happen obviously wasn't a threat, so… "Alright, kid, she's right down the hall."

Kame brushed by them without thanks, looking ahead to see what the next hurdle would be: One female Leaf jonin standing in front of the doorway of the room. The kunoichi, a Hyuga, had the Byakugan active and stared him down as he approached. _How do I play this one? I don't think she'll fall for the 'idiot kid' act. In fact, she probably knows exactly who I am, so my only option is to try to win her over as myself._

He stepped before the door, but the Hyuga kunoichi moved an arm into his path. "No visitors are permitted at this time, by order of the Hokage."

Kame looked up into her eyes. "I want to see my teammate one last time before she _dies_ by order of the Hokage."

The kunoichi flinched, but swallowed and maintained composure. "I'm afraid that my orders explicitly prevent me from allowing you into her room."

"And do you agree with them?" Kame looked straight into her pale eyes.

"What?"

"Your orders. Do you agree with them? Do you, personally, feel as though I should be barred from seeing my unconscious friend one final time before she gets murdered?"

The woman flushed. "Whether I agree with them has nothing to do with my carrying them out to the fullest of my ability."

"Do you think that-"

"Enough." A familiar voice trailed out from within the room, and the Leaf jonin quickly moved out of the way. The door was opened from the inside to reveal Gaara, looking more tired and defeated than Kame had ever seen him. "Hanari, thank you for your diligence, but I actually wish to speak to Kame inside the room."

The Hyuga actually looked relieved as she allowed Kame to step through the doorway. Inside the hospital room there was only the bare necessities, a small table with a scattering of objects on it and a few chairs, as well as the bed in which Haku lay.

At the sight of her, Kame's wavering heart realigned itself. She looked so peaceful lying there, a seal drawn on her forehead that would keep her asleep. Her purple hair lay scattered about on the pillow, but-

"Kame." Gaara's voice was as depressed as his expression.

"Kazekage." Kame turned to face his superior, doing his best not to reach towards the pocket in which he stored the two pieces of paper. Looking into the blue eyes of the Hidden Sand's leader, he couldn't muster the rage that he'd assumed would come. _I don't hate him,_ Kame realized. _I think he's made terrible mistakes, and I despise that he caved in to the other Kage to let Haku die, but… at the end of the day, he tried to help her._

"Kame, you have a packed bag and you're coming to Haku hours before she's slated to be…" he trailed off, seemingly unable to say it out loud. "I don't know what you're planning, but…"

Kame considered his situation. _I have to take a risk, but which one? Either I tell him I'm leaving, or I try to sneak out the reverse-summoning paper without him noticing._ After a few seconds, he decided to go with the option that didn't involve trying to fool a Kage-level ninja. "I was offered a way out from the Hidden Leaf, and I'm taking Haku with me."

Gaara's expression went from despair to worry and he turned away from Kame, looking out the window for long seconds. Eventually, he visibly reached a decision and faced back towards the genin. "I came here to dissuade you from taking that very course of action." Kame dropped his head in frustration. _Okay, now I have to-_ "But… who am I kidding. I can't stop you from doing something that I would be doing if I weren't the Kazekage. I can't- no, I _won't_ stop one of my shinobi from saving a friend from an undeserved death. I can't encourage you, but… I won't stop you. However, be warned: I can't pardon you anytime in the near future, and if Haku comes to the Hidden Sand I can't allow her entry, understood?"

Kame's throat was a little bit raw as he fully considered what was ahead of him. _My mom and dad… I might not see them for a long time. Deihaka-sensei, Miriki, Gaara, Kankuro, everyone… can I really just…_ He turned to see Haku lying on the bed. _I might not see them for a long time, but Haku doesn't deserve to never see them again, ever._ "I swore an oath to protect her, and I'm not going back on it."

Gaara's face lost its sadness. "Thank you for acting when I could not."

Kame tried to keep it together long enough to say his last goodbyes. "Lord Kazekage, could I ask… will you tell Deihaka-sensei and my parents that I'm sorry, and that I hope to see them again?" Gaara nodded. "And tell Miriki that I'm going to… miss him…" _I really am, huh? As annoying as he is, I…_ "And tell Master Kankuro that I'll keep up my exercises while I'm gone."

Gaara bowed his head in agreement, and Kame swallowed, taking one last look at the Kazekage as he reached into his pocket and pulled out the two papers. He rubbed the seal off of Haku's forehead, although she still wouldn't wake up for a while yet, and then yanked the cards apart and placed one on Haku's forehead where the seal had been.

"Kame?" Gaara's face was smiling, now. As Kame felt the jutsu take hold and lost sensation through his body, he was left with a few final words: "I'm proud of you."


	23. Arc 3 Vol 1: The Hidden Sound

**(A/N) Why, Kishimoto, why...**

 **Bingo Book Entry: Himei**

Threat Level: S  
Ninjutsu: 4/10  
Genjutsu: 9/10  
Taijutsu: 5/10

Village of Origin: Hidden Mist  
Status: Attack On Sight (rank jonin or higher)  
Known Crimes: Murders (16), Kidnappings (31)

Combat Style: Mid-range genjutsu user. Reliant on sound, effective against those who can hear him. Cursemark greatly increases attacking power.

Notes: Believed to have defected from the Hidden Mist after complications with a family member. Was A-rank jonin before betrayal, so approach with extreme caution. Currently works under Orochimaru, has cursemark that increases threat level to S-rank.

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When Kame's senses returned, he was standing in a small forest clearing, right next to Haku. A quick look over at her confirmed that she wasn't harmed, but still completely unconscious. _Okay, now where is…_

"Welcome, children!" Kame whipped around to see… a kindly-looking old woman smiling at him in a motherly way and wringing her hands. She was stooped over with age, but her eyes sparkled in joy and her voice was sympathetic. "Lord Orochimaru told me that you two would be coming, so I prepared your rooms. Come, follow me." The woman stepped forward and placed a hand on Haku's stomach, applying a seal of some sort. When she turned and walked off into the trees, Haku floated up and came with her, leaving Kame with little choice but to continue after them.

Curiosity overran his good sense, and he asked the question that was on his mind: "Excuse me, Orochimaru's underling, but-"

"You can call me Grandmother." She smiled at him with far more love than she should have for a kid she'd met seconds earlier.

 _This is the last thing I expected from someone working for Orochimaru…_ Kame was at a complete loss, so he swallowed and did as she asked. "Okay, Grandmother, but… who are you? And why are you working…" he trailed off helplessly.

She chuckled. "I'm Grandmother, and that's all you need to worry about. I'm in charge of resources at the Hidden Sound, so I'm the one making sure you get what you need. Do you have a favorite food?"

 _I never would have guess that this would be my first conversation as a Hidden Sound ninja._ "Uhmm… I like sashimi?"

"Okay, and what about clothes? Do you want more modeled after what you already have, or should I… Actually, I'll bring over some options, and you can look at them." _What is this woman…_ Kame was rapidly reconsidering his established ideas of what missing-ninja were like.

"Are you… a missing-ninja?" Kame asked her.

She just smiled back at him. "Don't ask too many questions, boy." _Okay, so she does have a hard side._

At some point they stepped forward and Kame flinched as a shimmer went through his eyes, revealing a huge green building that sloped diagonally up from the ground. _So it's hidden behind an illusory genjutsu, huh?_ The front wall that faced them had a massive pair of iron double doors, but as the Grandmother woman strode forward she simply waved her hand. Strangely silent, the doors opened slowly seemingly by themselves to allow them into the base.

Kame hesitated before stepping inside, but then he reminded himself: _I'm past the point of no return now._ _I have to see this through, at least as long as Haku is in danger from the great villages._ He hurried to catch up to Grandmother, following her through twisting passages that defied his attempts to form a mental map. Occasionally they passed by doorways, but they were always closed. The only sound Kame registered was their footsteps. _This place seems deserted… is Orochimaru short on followers?_

Finally they reached a purple wooden door and Grandmother pushed it open, then levitated Haku inside. Kame entered the room to find two beds, two cabinets, and… nothing else. It was a little bit depressing how bleak the place looked. After she dropped Haku down onto one of the beds and tucked her in, Grandmother turned to him and pouted. "Lord Orochimaru didn't tell me what kind of kids you two were, so I didn't know how to decorate- how about you tell me a little about yourself, and the girl."

Kame sat down on his own bed. _Why is this woman so… motherly?_ "My name's Kame Hakiara, and this is Haku… Yorutsume." _No point in hiding her clan name anymore._ "I like reading about ninja theory and history, working… with… paper…?" He faltered in his speech as Grandmother removed a card from her pocket, placed it on the floor beside his bed, and then with a puff of smoke summoned forth a bookshelf stocked full of books. _Did she prepare these ahead of time?_

"They aren't all ninja history, but I'm sure you can find something you like."

"Th- Thanks, Grandmother…" Kame thought more about what he needed. "Uhm, I also do a lot of work with paper, so…" A huge stack of blank paper was summoned on top of his cabinet. "Thanks… Haku likes…" He thought back to when he'd been inside her home. She'd had books, but besides that she seemed to only have the absolute bare necessities. "I think she'll want to decide for herself when she wakes up."

"Oh, aren't you the sweetest…" Grandmother put the pile of cards away in her pocket. "If you're hungry, just say so. I'm always listening…" She retreated out the doorway, leaving Kame to desperately try and forget what she'd just said.

Somehow, it all hit Kame at once. His shock must have finally subsided, because like a dam had broken in his mind a flood of feelings and thoughts pushed him under. The most shameful one, and the one he repressed the quickest, was a flinch away from Haku as he remembered how she'd killed Sagino. _If you keep her at arm's length now, Kame, you're no better than everyone else who's abandoned her. You knew all along that she had the tentails sealed inside of her._

 _But…_ an inner voice refused to be silenced. _You didn't know until now what that really meant. To go out on missions with someone who could snap and kill you at any moment, someone possessed by evil itself._ He looked over at Haku, lying still and silent. _She could wake up right now and attack you, and you'd die…_

' _I swear to save Haku.'_ Once again, Kame's promise to Gaara kept his mind from straying any further, and he cleared the thoughts of abandoning her away. In their place came thoughts of what lay in the future for them, most of which weren't happy. _We're missing-ninja now,_ he thought. _There are bounties on our heads, and any ninja we run into will do their best to capture or kill us._ No matter how many times he told himself otherwise, the guilt for their situation seemed to only grow heavier and heavier on his shoulders. _The only thing keeping us from being hunted down by ANBU from several villages is Orochimaru's favor._

 _I wonder what we'll have to do to stay in his good graces._ Kame shuddered a little bit, remembering all the stories he'd heard of Orochimaru's twisted experiments that invariably required massive loss of life. _When I was younger,_ he remembered, _I actually thought he was pretty cool, going by himself against the entire ninja world in order to push the bounds of science. But when I got to the details, the deaths of innocent civilians, and the hunger for more and more power…_

 _Then, in more recent history, it seemed like he'd actually taken a turn for the better. He established the Village Hidden in the Sound as a legitimate ninja village, he allied with several other villages, the abductions and murders stopped… but then, three years ago, it all changed._ Kame remembered it well, hearing in hushed murmurs from the adults about how Orochimaru had eradicated his own village, killing everyone inside it and fleeing. _Why did he do it? Why even establish a village if that was his intent? For me to work under someone so evil…_

 _If he asks me to kill an innocent person, can I do it?_ Kame didn't want to think about it, but his incessant curiosity wouldn't obey him. _Would I? To save myself, to save Haku, would I do evil things for an evil person?_ He shuddered as he realized that he _would_. To protect those close to him, he was hard-pressed to think of something he _wouldn't_ do. _Am I evil, then, to selfishly put the things I care about higher than the people I don't know? If everyone had my attitude, then… well, that's how shinobi wars happen, and how people can fight and kill others without any reservations._

 _Doesn't that make me-_

"K… Kame…?" Haku's weak voice trailed from his side and his thoughts immediately halted, replaced with an implacable combination of fear, joy, and sadness.

He turned to see that she was propped up with her back against the bed's headboard, knees raised underneath the covers almost to her chest. She seemed incredibly worried as she looked around, glancing at the room in clear confusion. "Where… where are we, Kame?"

 _Okay,_ Kame thought as he inhaled deeply, _how am I going to go about this. I can't clam up like I always do; she needs me._ "What do you remember, Haku?" The question was layered- on the surface, it was a way to find out what he had to fill her in on. Underneath, though, he was also asking her about the memories that Naruko's genjutsu had dug up.

"Everything…" Haku's voice grew soft and she wrapped her arms around the legs pulled up against her chest. "My family, I… I…" Her breathing became erratic. "My mom and dad… I remember…"

Kame was completely out of his depth. He'd never been particularly good with people, especially emotionally unstable ones, but he had to do his best here because he was all she had. "Haku, it's okay, just don't worry." _I think I read somewhere that you're supposed to talk it out with people? I think she needs someone to hear her out and then accept her after knowing everything._ "If it isn't too painful, can you… tell me?"

Haku remained silent for a long time, but right before Kame was going to follow upon his question, she launched into her story. "I remember childhood, growing up with my clan… my family. I was raised to be a ninja for as long as I can remember, but I think…" she trailed off tentatively. "I think they loved me."

Then she looked down into her lap, her voice growing strained. "They said that I was going to be the future of the clan because I had a really strong kekkegenkai, and then… that night… they put _it_ inside me." Haku dropped her head onto her knees. "And then I killed every last one of them."

"No-" Kame immediately reacted, but then calmed himself down a little bit. _You have to say this right._ "Haku, you didn't kill your family, and you didn't kill Sagino-" when he mentioned the death of their friend, Haku flinched. _She didn't know? Shit!_ "-the tentails did. You couldn't control it, but that's not your fault." She didn't respond. "Haku, look at me. You aren't…"

He stopped talking when she did look up at him, and her tear-streaked eyes met his. Suddenly, Kame felt a lump in his throat that, try as he might, he couldn't force down. Haku let out a tiny sob, and then spoke. "But it is my fault. You don't understand… after the tentails was put inside me, I can… hear it, talking to me…"

 _What? I thought that the tentails didn't have a lucid mind…_ "What does it say?"

"It whispers to me, whenever things get bad…" She spoke softly, as if the words themselves were dangerous. "When I would feel alone, or unwanted, or hurt, it would tell me to just give in. It told me that I didn't matter, that…" her voice broke a little bit. "When they put it inside me, I gave in and let it take control… and then I just watched and felt while I ripped my family and friends apart."

 _Does that mean that during the exams, she willingly let it…_ Kame tried his best to keep the horror from creeping onto his face. Haku didn't seem to notice and moved forward. "When I woke up, I was outside the Sand, and then I met Gaara. He must have… he was the one who…" _Crippled her_ , Kame thought. "But… I still care about him." _What?_ "He was the one who would come to me when I was younger, the only one who I could talk to. When I wanted to be a shinobi, he was the one who supported me.

"But… when you told me that I couldn't stand against a real shinobi, after everyone else did… and then, when I saw what I did to my family… and when I saw that it was _Gaara_ who ruined my…" She trailed off, clenching her fists and refusing to meet Kame's eyes. "I let go, and gave in to the monster inside me. It's my fault that Sagino is dead."

Kame wanted to deny it, but his voice failed him. Haku sniffled and wiped away the tears from her face. "I remember hurting Naruto and Sasuke, too… and Shira and Rock Lee… did they…?"

"No, they didn't." _That's one good thing I can tell her, at least._ "They all survived," Kame specified in case she misunderstood. "After the Tanikage took you out of tentails state, the medical-ninja arrived and managed to save everyone except…" _Sagino was instantly dead from having most of her upper body crushed,_ he remembered. Gunaji had returned and attempted to stab Haku's unconscious body, but Miriki had stopped the attack and then ANBU had arrived to cart her off.

A little bit of relief cut through the despair on Haku's face. "They're okay… but, I killed another ninja. Am I gonna be punished? Where are we, is this the hospital?"

 _Crap,_ Kame thought. _I knew that I'd have to break it to her eventually, but that doesn't make this any easier._ "The thing is… after finding out that you had your clan kekkegenkai _and_ the tentails, the Kage who were there fought about who was going to look after you." Haku's face grew worried, and it was difficult for Kame to keep saying things that would only make her feel worse and worse. "So… after a lot of arguing, they decided…" _How do I say this to her?_ "The Hokage, Tanikage, and Raikage outvoted Gaara and decided that you were too dangerous to let live."

Haku leaned back, despair worsening in her expression: "So… when am I…"

Kame shook his head. "I was there when they took the vote, but left out of anger, and then I ran into someone who told me that I could save you."

Hope flitted into her eyes. "Who? Does that mean…"

Kame nodded. "I got you out of the Leaf before they could kill you. We're… well, I don't know _exactly_ where we are, but it's-" _No, it's pretty far from safe._ "You aren't going to die if I can help it. I'm not gonna let you get hurt any more."

Haku cracked a small smile, and Kame knew that everything he'd done was worth it. _I need to tell her about the costs… but not right now. She deserves to be happy, at least for a few minutes._ Finally, she asked him, "Who was it? Did Gaara go against the agreement?"

"No. It was…" _Just say it._ "It was Orochimaru."

Her eyes dulled and her smile faded slowly. "Oh… so, does that mean that…"

"Yes." Kame winced as the words left his mouth. "We're missing-ninja now." She looked down, then sniffled and his resolve finally broke. "Haku, I'm so, so, so sorry. I can't ever apologize enough for what I-"

In a blur of her unnatural speed, she was suddenly pressed against him. Kame flinched anxiously but softened as she wrapped her arms around him and put her head over his shoulder. "Don't say sorry. You're the only one who-" she choked off with a sob and his shoulder started to feel warm and wet. _Is she… crying?_ Kame did the only thing he could think of and returned her hug, and as he rested his own head beside hers for the briefest moment he thought: _Maybe things will be okay after all…_

After a stretch of time that could have been hours or seconds for all Kame knew, a soft voice trailed over to them: "Hey, Kame… oh, and your little friend woke up!" Kame and Haku both leaped backwards instinctually and entered combat stances, turning to face the new foe. However, standing in the doorway was Grandmother, who was smiling as kindly as ever and actually waving hello. "Anywho, you kids should follow me. Lord Orochimaru has requested you come see him."

Haku glanced over at Kame, who tried to give her a reassuring look. As the elderly woman turned and walked off down the hallway, he went along with her. Haku pursued, caught up to him, and took his hand without meeting his eyes, and he hoped his blush wasn't obvious enough for her to notice.. They silently went down more twisting passageways until they reached another large door, walking through it to stand before Orochimaru.

When they crossed the threshold, Kame scanned the room quickly. It was large and had a high roof, along with a raised portion towards the back, dimly lit and entirely made of stone. On the raised plinth there was a throne, and on the throne sat Orochimaru. The woman turned and left without saying a word, leaving Kame and Haku standing there and feeling exposed. Orochimaru was staring at them with unblinking, snakelike eyes, wearing the same yellows and greens that he wore in most of his images.

Finally, he spoke. "Kame. Haku. Do the both of you pledge to aid my cause, to see my orders through without exemption?"

Kame swallowed. _Even though there isn't really a choice, and I set my course when I took Haku away from the Hidden Leaf, I'm still hesitant…_ "Why?"

"Hmmm?" Orochimaru looked at him with curiosity. "What are you asking me?"

"I don't understand…" Kame trailed off. "You were never an easy person to find information on, but what I did see was indicative that you had little to no empathy." _Damn it, there goes my habit of talking like a textbook when I'm stressed._ "You snatched up ninja and civilians from all over the world to aid you in your experiments, used up people and left them in the dust without compassion." _Way to insult the person who holds your life in his hands_. "Recently, it gets more complicated… You made the Hidden Sound into a legitimate village, worked as its Kage for years, and then…" Kame trailed off as Orochimaru's expression turned murderous. "So then that got me confused, and I wasn't sure if you were developing morals, or just tricking the whole ninja world into thinking you'd gone soft…" _Oh, damn. If me and Haku made it through all of this just to die because I offended him…_

"But then you turned on the village, eradicated everyone inside, and disappeared for a few years, before returning to your old ways. People started disappearing again- hell, me and Haku went on a mission recently to deal with one of your lairs. Why have you been so erratic? Why did you start a village, only to burn it to the ground?"

Orochimaru's eyes glinted with a hint of amusement and his mouth twitched. "You've certainly done your homework." Kame felt his face grow warm, looking down towards the ground and not responding. "While I _was_ intrigued by Sasuke Uchiha's 'new path', it turned out to lead nowhere. The clone of mine who followed it failed to achieve anything of note whatsoever before it died protecting a friend, and the years I spent attempting to conduct research without test subjects were utterly wasted. Unlike death, scientific progress has a cost that cannot be cheated."

Kame swallowed. _So the rumors of him going soft were false…_ Orochimaru wasn't done. "I did make the Hidden Sound into an official village and strike up amicable relations with Konohagakure, but after a… difference of opinion, I came to regret both decisions. The reason I left the Hidden Leaf in the first place was their accursed adherence to their morals that held back my research, and the years gone by haven't changed that in the slightest. When the Sound was destroyed, I opted to not rebuild and instead finish things by cutting ties with the Leaf and going back outside the system. While cloning technology has reduced my need for subjects and made relations with the larger shinobi villages more tolerable, I can assure you…"

He leaned forward from his throne, killing intent spiking intensely enough to make Kame flinch. "I am far from 'soft'."

While Kame stood mutely, Haku somehow brushed off the oppressive killing intent to ask Orochimaru a question. "If that's true, then why do you need me and Kame?"

The Sannin turned to face her, tilting his head in curiosity. "I _need_ very little in this world, little genin. However, I _want_ a very great many things, and since Sankuryu's interesting report, one of them is to study you. Since that would require bringing you here, against the wishes of the great villages, then I may as well get as much as I can from the process. You have a tailed beast stronger than any other sealed within you as well as a deadly kekkegenkai, and Kame has the analytical mind and drive of a prodigy."

Haku nodded, but Orochimaru kept going. "The two of you are missing-ninja without enough strength to avoid the great villages' clutches for long. Naruto Uzumaki's ideology that had permeated ninja society prizes friendship for the strength it gives, but I see through that lie. It is true that gathering followers gives a person strength, but friendship is an unnecessary distraction." He sat back in the throne. "So I'll ask you once more. Do you swear to serve me, to follow my orders to the end and make my will your greatest wish?"

 _I don't have a choice._ "Yes." Kame nodded. After a pause, Haku echoed his oath.

"Excellent." The words came from _behind_ them, and the Orochimaru on the throne simply puffed out of existence. Neither Kame nor Haku turned around quickly enough to avoid Orochimaru's extending head biting them on the back of the neck. _What… why would…_ Kame's eyes rolled up into his head and he lost consciousness.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

"I can't believe that, out of everyone under his sway, Lord Orochimaru chose _me_ to babysit you two." The man standing in their doorway was approaching middle-age, well-muscled but leaning against the wall tiredly. He wore the grey-and-purple clothing of the Hidden Sound, along with the purple headband wrapped around his upper arm. Although beardless, his grizzled face had enough scraggly hair on it to indicate his lack of attention towards appearances. "Well? Come on!" Kame hastily stood up to obey the man's order, and after he nodded to her Haku did as well.

"Now, my name is Himei- or, my code name is Himei. Actually, my real name is something that you'll never know. In the Hidden Sound, anyone important goes by a false name or a title, and I'm one of the most important." He swapped tones into a quiet grumble, "but evidently not important enough to avoid having to be the damn tour guide."

Kame chose to respond to the first part of his statement and ignore the second. "Like 'Grandmother'?"

"Yes, like Grandmother. I see you met her, then?" Kame nodded. "Great, now I don't have to haul you over for introductions. She's in charge of resources, which basically means her job is to get all the above-board stuff for our . Food, equipment, housing, she keeps track of it all." _One person being in charge of all that…_ "She's a little eccentric, but honestly she's one of the nicest people you'll run into here." He put an arm behind his head awkwardly. "Look, I'm not gonna lie here… the people who wear Orochimaru's cursemark tend not to be the nicest lot."

Kame instinctively reached for the back of his neck, which had been sore as hell when he'd woken up. Without a mirror, he and Haku had been reduced to describing their cursemarks to one another- Haku's was a curved inward spiral with three lines, while his was the same thing except with straight lines at right angles. They hurt to touch, although that was probably just due to Orochimaru's bite rather than the marks themselves.

With a wide smile, Himei pointed towards a passageway leading off to the left. "Alright, Lord Orochimaru requested your presence in the room at the end of that hall when your tour was finished. Man, am I glad that you guys already met Grandmother, because I was _not_ looking forward to hiking all the way to the labs and storage chambers."

Kame was confused. "Wait, but you were only going to introduce us to one person- and then you didn't even do _that_! Where are all the people?"

Himei shoved his hands into his pockets and shrugged. "There aren't any, right now."

 _What?_ "This huge base is for _three_ people?"

"Well, with the addition of you two and the people out on missions, it's actually for eight people." Kame opened his mouth to ask another question, but Himei guessed his intent. "No, this isn't the only base, and it's not the main experiment location either. It's just the best-hidden, so only Orochimaru, Grandmother, and the Sound Ninja Four are allowed here. And now you two, I guess… anyway, I just saved a whole lot of time, so I'd rather not lose it all explaining everything to you."

"Why are you in such a rush?" Haku asked.

The question made Himei blush like a schoolgirl and turn away. "Don't worry about it."

Kame and Haku were left to do as he'd asked and make their way down the long hallway, at the end of which was a doorless entrance to a widened room. _Is he waiting in there? It looks empty; what's going on?_ Kame hesitantly made his way forward, but no attacks or surprises came, so he dropped his guard and loosened up.

Of course, when Orochimaru rose up from the ground behind him and started talking, that made it all the more shocking. Once he'd calmed down, Kame paid close attention to the Sannin's proclamation. "The both of you are clearly chunin-level shinobi, but since the reshaping that makes you the weakest ninja in the Hidden Sound." _Really? Grandmother can fight better than Haku?_ "I plan to make the both of you jonin-rank as soon as possible, because with an infinite supply of clones we don't undertake the sort of civilian capture missions you two are qualified for.

"I still have occasional need of genetic material from specific kekkegenkai and certain powerful ninja, the collection of which is what the majority of your Sound missions will be. However, neither of you are fit to leave this village until you are able to hold your own at a jonin-level at least, because if your identities are discovered then A-rank missions will be organized to hunt you down." _Deihaka-sensei would be coming after me,_ Kame thought.

"To this end, I've given each of you powerful cursemarks, which I'll train you to use. Beyond this, I have other practices for the two of you to perform. Kame," he said, turning to face Kame and producing a huge scroll, "This is a summoning contract that I haven't had a use for until now." He tossed the massive thing over to Kame, who managed to catch it before it crashed to the floor. "Haku, your situation is not as unique as it seems at first glance. The Kazekage's chakra seal is actually highly similar to a seal placed on Sankuryu. Like I did in his case, I've managed to warp the seal in order to allow limited use of chakra, and he will train you to use it."

Kame raised his hand, then dropped it. _What am I doing!? I'm not a damn academy student, I can just ask him questions._ "Lord Orochimaru, your explanation for why you're taking us under your wing is…" _How do I phrase this without causing offense?_ "It's not the whole story, is it?"

Orochimaru looked at him, expression unreadable. "Oh?"

"For you to make a whole, legitimate village and then dissolve it… then pick up a random jinchuriki and genin and decide to make them into weapons… it doesn't add up." Kame bit his lip anxiously. "Why would you do all this for such little gain?"

The Sannin _smiled_ at that. "You aren't wrong… but _that_ answer won't come so easily. Perhaps in time you may earn it." He strode forward. "Now, let's begin."


	24. Arc 3 Vol 2: Uebu Abyss

**Bingo Book Entry: Grandmother**

Threat Level: C  
Ninjutsu: 9/10  
Genjutsu: 1/10  
Taijutsu: 1/10

Village of Origin: ?  
Status: Capture On Sight (do not kill under any circumstances)  
Known Crimes: ?

Combat Style: Never seen to fight. Evidence suggests little to no combat abilities.

Notes: Central figure of Orochimaru's organization. Known to carry incredibly important documents and keys around with her. Unknown origin, first appearances began after the destruction of the Hidden Sound. Has a cursemark, but its use is unknown.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

 _Where in the hell am I!?_ Kame rose up from the ground, his thumb still stinging from the small cut he'd made. _Orochimaru taught me how to use the summoning jutsu, then brought out the contract for me to sign… but the second I touched it, something happened. Now I'm here? Where is here?_ He looked around at his surroundings, which mostly consisted of massive trees.

 _No, not trees… what are those?_ In the dim light that didn't seem to really _have_ a source, Kame could barely make out the huge forms shooting up into the sky. He was lucky in being cautious with his first step forward, because it went nowhere- there was nothing in front of him. After throwing himself backwards onto solid ground, he took more careful stock of the area- he was standing on top of a large, flat island of stone. There were spires (presumably also made of rock) shooting up far enough that he couldn't see where they ended- although as his eyes grew accustomed to the darkness, he could pick out eight of them that were significantly larger than the others and arrayed in a rough circle.

 _Okay, keep calm, Kame. What could this be? A genjutsu?_ He tried to perform genjutsu release, but nothing happened. _Alright, then I'm either actually here or under the genjutsu of someone far more powerful than I can hope to defeat. Either way, my best bet is to just play along like the world is real and hope I don't die._ He looked in a circle around his little island and noticed that it wasn't actually floating- long white ropes stretched out into the darkness, connecting with each other and the spires in intricate patterns.

One rope, thicker than the others, looked thick enough to stand on. _Do I…?_ He looked around one more time, but there was nothing moving or making any noise besides him. _Okay, then exploring forward it is._ Kame nervously proceeded forward, keeping a kunai ready, as he stepped onto the white surface of the… _well, it seems way too big for me to call it a rope. An anchor? A pathway?_ The second he put his weight on it, a shudder went through it and seemed to ripple through all the other ropes in sight.

Testing his weight on it, despite the initial shaking it seemed more than capable of bearing his weight. It was five feet in diameter, so he could actually just walk on it without attempting to attach himself to it. _Better safe than sorry, though,_ he thought as he pushed some chakra into his feet- and then couldn't move. _What?_ When he lowered himself to examine it, the substance was strangely soft to the touch while refusing to come away in his hand, even a little bit sticky. _Somehow, it's taking to my chakra way more than anything else I've seen… this is gonna be tricky._

 _No chakra-sticking, then_. As he continued forward, a form began to emerge from the shadows ahead of him- another island, with something resting atop it. Other ropes also lead to the island, which was maybe ten meters wide and had nothing underneath it, just a drop straight down into…

 _Damn it._ Kame had been carefully avoiding looking down, but when he finally did he was actually a bit less terrified than he'd thought he'd be. Underneath and above him were more of the same, just white ropes of varying thickness crisscrossing with each other and attaching to spires and islands of rock. Still, if there was any ground down below him it was too far down for him to see, and he hurried forward before the anxiety could grow into terror, focusing his eyes on his white pathway rather than his surroundings.

That proved to be a mistake because when he finally reached the island and looked up, he was staring directly into the eyes of a massive spider. The mental numbness of the last two days was the only thing that kept him from freezing up with shock and falling into the abyss right then and there, but he was able to move himself onto dry land before his eyes fully registered what was right in front of him. The monstrous spider had to be at least six feet from front to back, with legs easily that long again. It was a brownish color, with eight black eyes that gazed at him expressionlessly. Kame had never been arachnophobic- he'd actually liked spiders and thought they were cool as a child, but the sight of such a massive one still put him on edge nonetheless.

Kame lowered his kunai a bit when it didn't move, but yanked it right back up defensively when it started speaking. In a chittering, oddly accented voice, it spoke: "You are the newest holder." _Holder? Holder of what?_ Kame had a sinking feeling as a suspicion entered his mind of what exactly was going on. "Unlike other summoned beings, our services must be _earned_." _God damn it, Orochimaru… did you know about this, and not warn me?_

"Uhm…" Kame tried to find his voice, but the huge mandibles of the immobile creature in front of him proved distracting. "I… and how do I go about… earning… these services?" _Please don't say sacrifices, please don't say sacrifices, please don't say-_

"You must make sacrifices." _I think that the gods are having a laugh at my expense,_ Kame thought bitterly. "You will be tested, and each test will have a much greater cost of failure. If you wish to leave, you need only say so- but to choose to do so will forever limit your future bond with the spiders." _That doesn't sound like the end of the world,_ thought Kame.

"So, …" Kame realized he didn't know what to call it. _I think it might be offended if I address it as 'spider?'_

"Kumogado," it supplied helpfully.

"Right, Kumogado, so what's the first test? And what are the sacrifices involved?" _As long as I know ahead of time, I can just choose to go home, right?_

"You may not know either of those things." Kame could swear that the unblinking, reflective eyes of the spider held just the tiniest hint of humor. _I must be going crazy._ "Now, do you agree to this test?"

"No!" Kame didn't even waste any time considering. "I'm absolutely not agreeing to rush into a test I know nothing about. Find another person to hold your contract if you expect me to-" he stopped talking as Kumogado chittered in… amusement?

"You pass the first test." _It…?_ _He? She?_ Kame didn't know enough about spiders to identify Kumogado's gender just by looking at them. If he had to guess, though, they seemed like a man. "The holder of the spider contract cannot be someone who would blindly follow the path of another with no thought of consequences- that is the way of the fly, not the spider. You have earned the loyalty of the weaver class and may continue forward, but first- what is your name?"

"Kame Hakiara." Kame was relieved at how easy the first test had been- not that he'd known while undertaking it, of course. As Kumogado's eight legs carried them off to the side (strangely respectfully), Kame could see that the long, thick strand kept going in the same direction- in fact, it didn't seem to be _attached_ to the island. It carried forward in a straight line, and if anything it seemed like the rocky mass had fallen onto it and stuck there.

Kame proceeded forward carefully, and now he began to see the forms moving around at the edge of his vision. His heart beat faster against his will and it took a lot of willpower for him to keep himself from descending into fear. Due to the wary way that the spiders stayed just outside his sight radius, coupled with the wild variance in size of the lines- no, _webs_ , Kame realized- he was unable to figure out how large in size or number the spiders were.

Eventually, he came upon another island, and just like the last one it was occupied by a dark and unmoving form. As he neared it, though, the differences became apparent- this one had piles of webbing scattered about on top of it, and the thing resting atop of it wasn't a spider. _Is that a… human?_ Kame narrowed his eyes as he closed the remaining distance, and the creature was indeed revealed to be a human woman.

She had pale skin and purple hair and eyes, similar to Haku's, with a body that was… well, Kame felt his nose bleed just from looking at her while she was still clothed. Before he flushed and turned away, he saw that she was well-muscled, had all the right curves, and was clad in only a loose robe with black bandages underneath. She was sitting back with her arms over the back of a couch, legs folded one over the other in front of her.

When the woman noticed him, she folded her human hands atop her knee and bent forward to look Kame in the eyes. He had to force himself to not look down the open collar of her kimono, swallowing as she spoke seductively. "Well, hello there, Kame." The fact that she knew his name should have terrified him, but all he could think at the moment was how glad he was that this goddess cared enough to learn it. "I'm Kumokafu… it's been _ages_ since we had another human in here."

When he froze up a few feet away from her, she frowned and beckoned him closer. "Come over here, Kame. Don't be a stranger, let me loosen you up…" In a daze, he stumbled forward, but at the very last moment her purple hair and eyes reminded him of how Haku _was_ and not just how she looked. _This woman is way too forward,_ he thought as he forced himself to take a step back away from her.

"What's this… what is this test?" Kame swallowed. "What do I have to do, and what am I risking?"

Kumokafu seemed unfazed by his last-minute rejection, simply returning to her original position and smiling at him. "It's simple… if you walk down that path behind me without touching anything, you pass."

 _What kind of test is this?_ "And if I fail?"

"Well, then you stay here with me… forever. It's been far too long since I had any… _pleasurable company_." The way she said that last bit sent a shiver running down Kame's spine. "I won't harm you- in fact, I'll make you feel more alive than you've ever felt in your short life…" She licked her lips hungrily.

 _But… no._ Kame turned to walk to her side, doing his best not to look at her. _If resisting her seduction is this whole test, then…_ his heart skipped a beat at something he hadn't noticed- a pile of books, on top of which sat a journal signed: _Genno Hakiara._ As if she knew what he was thinking, Kumokafu continued. "Yes, _Hakiara_ , your ancestor held our contract as well. He left much of his wisdom within our realm… go ahead, pick it up." _I didn't know that Genno was a spider summoner,_ Kame thought as he reached over to pick up the book. _But I guess-_

At the last moment, he yanked himself away from it. _Damn it, she almost got me. I just have to walk directly to the exit and ignore everything else._ When she spoke again, though, he failed to ignore her and slowed to a stop at her words. "Do you want Haku to find safety? We can take her away from Orochimaru, remove the tentails from her. She could be free of the burden that's rested on her shoulders for her entire life."

 _They could save Haku. I could stay here with this woman, learning about Genno's ways and improving myself, and Haku would be safe._ Kame turned slowly to meet Kumokafu's eyes, but while they were the same purple color as Haku's, they were narrowed in a predatory dominance that he couldn't imagine Haku showing. That little detail was enough to give him the lucidity to question her promise. _If I stay here forever, I would never know if they helped Haku. But… it's more selfish than that. If I stay here, I wouldn't ever get to see Haku again._

He ripped his eyes off of Kumokafu's perfect form sitting feet away from him and forced himself to plant one foot in front of the other, finally stepping off the island. The moment he did, her voice drifted back to him again: "What a pity… you would have made a nice spider." Kame glanced behind him to see that, in place of the books and couch and woman, there sat a spider a little smaller than Kumogado, still speaking in the same voice. "Genno was no fun, either… but you pass, just as he did. You ignored your personal temptations in your search for wisdom, which is enough for the loyalty of the trickster class." As Kame turned away, he noticed the red hourglass on her black body- _a black widow._

During the long walk to whatever the next island held, Kame tried not to think about what might have happened to him had he accepted her offer. He was aided in that when an incredibly loud grinding sound came from off to his side. It turned out to be coming from one of the eight massive pillars, which was _moving_ a little bit to the side before coming to a stop. _Wait… there are eight of those, all of which lead up into…_ Suddenly, Kame was very eager to go back to considering his fate at the hands of Kumokafu.

Eventually he was spared from the mental gymnastics by the appearance of the next island. This one was a bit different, made up of several smaller chunks of rock bound together by intricate webbing. It was also significantly larger, perhaps a hundred feet from one side to the other- but Kame saw the reason why. The spider occupying it was _twenty_ feet wide as it stood still at the center, intimidating even for its size. It appeared to be wearing armor in long plates covering its legs and body, with a metal helmet over its head. Small tufts of orangetarantula-like hairs bunched out of the chinks in its polished armor.

The moment his feet touched dry land, the spider spoke in a gruff voice. "I am Kumokotto. Your challenge, if you choose to accept it, will be to avoid being cut for a full minute within my domain. The penalty for losing is whatever damage you sustain from the attack that defeats you."

 _Direct and to-the-point, huh?_ Kame considered the situation. _His legs end in sharp blades, so he'll try to attack me with those. Even if I fail, I'm pretty confident that I can keep the damage I take to a minimum, and then Orochimaru or one of his underlings will heal me._ "Alright, Kumokotto, I accept your challenge."

The spider lowered himself a little bit, sinking down and tensing his legs, while Kame quickly looked around at what he had to work with. There was one visible stone that seemed like a good substitution candidate-

And he was forced to use immediately as Kumokotto moved forward with speed rivalling Haku's and stabbed a leg straight into said stone, shattering it into pieces that fell into the chasm below them. _This was a mistake,_ Kame thought. _But I'm in too deep now, so…_ Against attacks _that_ fast, his only real option was to predict them. _Does Kumokotto have any tells?_ Once again, the spider seemed to bunch up a bit, facing directly towards Kame, and…

Right as his opponent launched himself forward, Kame leaped to the right and landed on some of the webbing attaching the islands to each other. A sixth sense warned him to jump onto the nearest rock as Kumokotto pressed his leg onto the web, and a faint glimmer of chakra pulsed through it. _These webs get sticky when you apply enough chakra to them,_ Kame remembered. _I have to keep dodging his attacks, but I can't end up on the webs or else I'll end up trapped in place._

The platform that Kumokotto had jumped to crumbled and fell away, joining the first platform and substitution stone in whatever lay below the realm of the spiders. Their pattern repeated many more times, until Kame risked a long jump onto a chunk of ground far to the side. When he turned back to reassess the situation, he realized his gross error- _Kumokotto's been planning this from the start. He pushed me to escape onto specific stones, destroyed them, and now…_ Kame stood on the only rock left for fifteen feet in any direction.

Kumokotto turned from closer to the center of the battlefield and tensed up. _I have to give up; if he hits me full-force there's no way that…_ _wait…_ Kame knew it was a stupid idea, but without anything else in mind he went for it. Dropping to his knees, he threw both arms forward and slammed them onto the webbing, then ran his chakra straight into the white substance. He forcibly ran his chakra forward through the conductive medium and finally onto the webbing Kumokotto was standing on. The large spider seemed to tense up and then shake its legs, attempting to break free from the webs to no avail.

 _It's been close to a minute, so I just have to…_ as seconds passed, it became clear that Kumokotto wasn't able to detach its legs from the webs. Kame felt his chakra strained as the webs were pushed and pulled, but the spider wasn't strong enough to break its own creation and after a brief struggle it relaxed itself. "The time has passed and so have you. You are successful in monitoring your situation and using the battlefield to your advantage, which has earned you the loyalty of the combat class."

Kame let go and stood wearily, stepping along the now-safe webbing and moving on down the central strand. _These punishments have been getting worse and worse. I can't get overconfident and agree to something too terrible._ As deep as he was in the webbing, now every direction seemed occupied by twisting and layered webbing. However, it wasn't all as random as it appeared at first glance- there seemed to be general layers that the webs would group into.

The next island had a small spider on it, even smaller than Kumokafu had been. While still significantly larger than any normal spider, it was only three feet from side to side and yellow with green patterns on it. As soon as he strode onto its island, it spoke to him like the others had, this time in an aristocratic and controlled manner. "I'm surprised to see you here, young one- none have advanced so far since Genno… but it remains to be seen if you'll continue in the path of your ancestor and succeed here like he did." Something in the spider's male voice made Kame feel like he doubted it.

 _So Kumokafu wasn't lying about Genno going through this. Information on him was always pretty scarce, but I never realized that he was so invested in a spider contract… maybe if I end up passing this, they'll tell me more about him._ Kame refocused on the new spider as he continued. "I am Kumojiken, and this test is of your skill. You must make it to the next patch of ground," he said, pointing a leg in the same direction that the huge web had been following. "The punishment is natural- if you fall in the process, you will not be caught. If you drop all the way to the Depths, then you will most likely be eaten." _Eaten? What are the 'Depths', and why is this one afraid of them?_

Kame looked at what he was dealing with in the gap between the two pieces of land- the massive strand appeared to have snapped, and although two more smaller strands anchored to it kept the rest from going slack, the main length of it was frayed into a thousand smaller pieces and trailing off into the chasm. _I don't know any transportation jutsu, but…_ Kame looked at the webbing. _It's strangely conductive to chakra… I think I have an idea. Besides, if this doesn't work, I can always just give up before I step out onto it._

He stepped forward to the edge of the island and laid his hands down onto the broken, splitting web. When he ran his chakra through it, he felt it run all the way down onto the loose ends with very little resistance, moving as though he already had a chakra thread running through it. _I think these webs are universal chakra threads,_ he realized, even as he got to work on his task.

With small movements of his fingers, he willed the trailing ends of the strands into motion, twisting them around and into each other. Kame was far from an expert on cloth or sewing, but he did know all too well how to fold paper; and the dexterity and high level of craft involved transferred over to what he was doing now. Kumojiken remained silent as Kame kept going, faster and faster, getting into a pattern as he weaved the broken threads together into something thicker and stronger. Minutes passed, and he began to feel his chakra reserves running… well, not _low_ , but also not close to full.

Eventually the threads grew large enough to resist the weaving, but at that point they were also large enough for him to simply walk on. _Alright, now for the harder part._ He channeled his chakra more powerfully into the webbing, willing it to move back and forth. Forward, backward, he swung it further and further each time, knowing that it was just long enough that…

Finally the very tip flew far enough forward that he felt the webbing at the far end of the chasm snap together with his end. _They both have my chakra running through them now, so they're sticking together twice as hard,_ Kame thought. _But now comes the most difficult part._ He sent his chakra all the way down the cleanly woven length of his creation, but getting it over to the other piece proved taxing. Even more difficult was trying to fumble through weaving the other web together with his chakra despite the distance and the gap between the two webs' chakra network, but he managed- at a much higher chakra cost.

As the other web was woven together, it shortened, which meant the two webs got less and less slack and began rising into the air. _I don't know if I can make it… my chakra's running really thin…_ As the webs reached a moderate height, Kame desperately tangled the ends together as much as he could into a messy and impossible knot. When he sat back with only the tiniest bit of chakra remaining, he panted out a long breath and looked at his masterpiece: a mostly woven stretch of web that trailed all the way across the chasm (with an ugly messy lump in the middle where he'd had to knot them together).

 _Okay, this is it. Do I go for it, or do I give up?_ Kame looked out at what he'd made and couldn't help but feel vaguely proud of it and of himself. _It looks pretty sturdy- no, I made it and I know for a fact that it's sturdy. The weaving I made won't come apart, and the webs themselves are stronger than steel, so there's no way that I'm going to break them under my weight._ He thought about Haku. _The stronger I am, the better I can protect her._ "Alright, here goes nothing."

He stepped out onto the web and it didn't even waver under his weight. Step by step, he kept going down the length of it, ready at any moment to run chakra through his feet in case the creation fell apart and he had to run back up it. As he reached the midway point, he stepped over the knot gingerly- _Alright, I didn't do that bad of a job with it… it's not as big and messy as I thought it was, after all_.

It was only a few steps out from the knot that he came to two realizations: First, that the threshold for the wall-walking technique was higher than the threshold to make the thread sticky, meaning that if the bridge _did_ collapse then he wouldn't be able to keep going, only stick himself in place. The second realization was that the knot _had_ been large, but had shrank while he'd walked across the bridge, which meant… _oh, shit._

Kame immediately increased pace, but a shudder ran through the web. He didn't even have time to look back as he increased to a full sprint- _If that knot comes undone before I make it across, then I'm dead meat._ He nearly made it, but mere feet away from the wall the center of the bridge finally fell apart and he tumbled downwards. Sheer instinct caused him to gather his chakra in his hand. "Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu!" The blast of air pushed him upwards, but in his panic he hadn't aimed right and would miss the platform and fall straight back down. Gathering his remaining chakra, he shouted, "Wind Style: Wind Cushion Jutsu!" and blasted enough force from his feet to throw himself forward onto the rocky surface of his target location.

As he lay there panting, he could only think, _that's it. No more challenges, no more risk, I'm completely done._ He didn't even flinch when the green-and-yellow head of Kumojiken appeared inches from his face and spoke: "Impressive- not as impressive as your predecessor, but more impressive than those who failed that challenge. Your skill and creativity have earned you the loyalty of the watcher class."

Kame forced himself onto his feet, fighting through the chakra exhaustion to look at what lay ahead. The path continued forwards and upwards, leading towards… _Oh, no..._


	25. Arc 3 Vol 3: Newfound Powers

**(A/N) A rare weekend upload, but I was feeling pretty productive after a helpful review.**

 **Bingo Book Entry: Genno Hakiara**

Threat Level: A  
Ninjutsu: 8/10  
Genjutsu: 6/10  
Taijutsu: 6/10

Village of Origin: Heat Devil Village  
Status: Report On Sight (approach only with extreme caution)  
Known Crimes: ?

Combat Style: Highly intelligent and great at formulating plans and traps. Excellent at infiltration. Great skill at most jutsu types. Hold contract with spiders.

Notes: If spotted, report and do not engage under any circumstances (unlikely that he was seen without intending to be seen). Allegiance and motives unknown after destruction of his village.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

 _I was really trying not to think about that, but…_ Kame couldn't force it from his mind any longer. The web pathway led diagonally up to somewhere before a hulking mass of… _Oh my god, I read about boss summons, but this is…_ the eight huge pillars he'd seen, each one probably a good fifteen feet thick, were in fact what he'd feared them to be: legs, all leading up to the gargantuan body of a spider that was hundreds of feet long. _And this pathway leads towards a spot before its head… no, no, no, no_. He opened his mouth to say the words that would quit the test and bring him back out of this place, but…

 _I can't do it, huh? If I leave now, I'll always wonder…_ and grudgingly, he set his course up the path and trudged forward. _Chakra's pretty much gone anyway, so the odds are that I won't be able to take on whatever this next challenge is._ _So far, let's see… I had to prove that I wasn't stupid to get the 'weaver class'... is that some sort of rank? Like academy student, genin, chunin, jonin? Following that logic and looking at the trickster, combat, and watcher classes… that means that if there are any more trials, it'll be for Kage-level summons._ Speaking of which, the monstrously massive spider defied what Kame had heard about Boss summons- they were large, granted, but not _that_ large.

As he moved forward, eventually he reached a platform that was constructed purely from webbing and connected with more of the massive threads reaching out in all directions. Now, the spiders were clearly visible and no longer trying to hide, instead moving with eerie silence all around on the surrounding threads. _There's a pattern…_ the levels that Kame had noticed earlier each had a certain color of spider on them. At the lowest one that he could see, normal-looking brown spiders scurried about. Above them were the deadly-looking black spiders similar to Kumokafu, and above that were orange tarantulas. The layer directly below him held the green-and-yellow ones, but now he was ascending even above that. _Oh, so that ranking system extends to even the way their realm is set up, huh?_

The platform Kame was moving onto was occupied by one of the smallests spiders yet, barely larger than normal, perhaps eight inches from left to right. When it finally spoke, it was in an aged man's croak: "Congratulations, young Hakiara, on getting further than any before you. You have earned the respect of the champions put forward by each of our ranks, for which you have received their support, but now you stand before the slumbering Nakama herself."

Kame had to stop himself from falling backwards when his eyes refocused and noticed the gargantuan head of what must be Nakama, eight eyes each as large as a whole person and mandibles large enough to destroy a house. _Nakama… 'broodmother'. His tone was reverent rather than respectful; do they worship the big one?_ "I'm glad that I met your expectations."

"Ah, not quite." _Huh?_ Kame looked back to the smaller creature before him. "You have yet to meet _my_ expectations and gain the support of the sage class." _Sage, like the toad ones who trained Naruto and Jiraiya. This is the tier above Boss summon, but if they look up to the boss summon then…_

"Who is Nakama? And who is your Boss summon?" Kame blurted out.

The spider's eyes focused on him, although he couldn't read any emotion from the reflective black surfaces. "Nakama is the great broodmother, the origin of life in the Uebu abyss. Our legends speak of a time when the spiders were pushed down into this place, a pit with no bottom and edges too far apart to be bridged. Nakama made a web greater and stronger than anything in the world in order to bridge the gap and make a home for her people, but the effort put her into an eternal slumber." Kame glanced down at the five-foot-wide web path that he'd been following. "No, that is the work of another. The true web of Nakama far stronger and lies far below us, and underneath it lie the Eaters, a class that have descended into mindless hunger but cannot come higher up." _A web even bigger than…_

"As for 'boss summon'... I will assume that this is a term the humans have used to describe the champions of each summon animal?" Kame nodded. "Ah, they belong to the combat class, but cannot serve in the trial for new summoners due to their duties keeping the Eaters in line. Perhaps in time you may come to know them, but before that… you are aware that your ancestor, Genno the Trap Master, held our contract, yes?"

"I found that out today."

"He never told you?" The spider sounded almost offended by the idea that his previous summoner had neglected to mention him.

"No, he died before I was born. I wanted to learn more about him, but during his time information was held much tighter than it is now, so most of the records have been destroyed. I did read something about him holding a contract with a giant eagle of some sort…?" _I hope that doesn't offend him any more…_

"No, but one of the tricksters is quite proficient at replicating other species." The spider stepped to the side suddenly and turned to look directly at Kame. "But enough time has been wasted. My name is Kumotensai, and I am one of the great spider sages. To earn the support of our class, there are many challenges. It is a long, difficult path that will take uninterrupted years to complete, and you will have only one opportunity to do so. This is the test that even Genno failed, because of a war that his village fell into with the Hidden Leaf, but you may succeed where he could not."

 _To surpass Genno…_ Kame swallowed. "Who else has held this contract? And how far did they go? Do you know about Genno, and anything he might have left behind?"

Kumotensai nodded in a way that Kame hoped was approving. "There have been many before Genno, but none of any real substance. Before Genno came, in fact, many among the lower classes began to question the rules of challenge, complaining that the humans would inevitably fail. Genno silenced them- he was the only one to ever earn the watchers' favor, and came close to even winning over the sages. He spent many years in our realm and left much, all of which I could teach you were you to accept my offer.

"After Genno's death, there have been several ninja to seek our support- but all either failed the first test or died during the subsequent ones. There was one who succeeded to garner the support of the weaver class named Kidomaru, but he did not seek anything further and died very soon. Since then, none have come- except you." Kame nodded at this information. _Orochimaru must have kept the contract for a while, then._ "But before any further talk, I must ask: will you attempt the trial of the sages? It will take several years, and during that time you may not leave the realm of the spiders. Your reward will be the power of the Spider Sage, a blessing never granted to a human before."

 _Kame Hakiara, the Spider Sage… I like the sound of that. Besides, I don't-_ Kame remembered why he was here and respectfully shook his head. "I can't. There are pressing matters in the human world that I cannot abandon, and a friend that needs my help." _But if I don't do this, then I'll always…_ "Could I attempt the trial later?"

Kumotensai rocked back, seeming to consider what he said. "The rules do not explicitly prohibit such a thing… so you may postpone your trial." He sounded happy. "If and when you do choose to undertake it, you need only tell one of your summons and then you will be brought here."

Kame nodded. _Someday, I'll do it… but for now, I need to know some things._ "How do I summon specific spiders? I feel like the classes you've mentioned each have strengths and weaknesses, so being able to choose seems necessary."

Kumotensai nodded, the movement shaking his whole body up and down. _So spiders nod like humans do… I never thought that I'd be thinking about this._ "To summon specific spiders you must first bond with them and learn to recognize their chakra, then call for it when performing the summoning jutsu itself. The weaver, trickster, combat, and watcher classes are all available to you, so you are welcome to go out among them and find members that you wish to bond with. Such a thing will take time, though…"

Kame nodded. "How do I come here to do that? Is there a reverse summoning jutsu that will bring me here, or…?"

"The same way you would tell us of your decision to undertake the sage trials. Simply summon any spider and tell them that you wish to travel to the Uebu Abyss, then dismiss them. I or another sage will reverse summon you through the contract shortly afterwards." _That's not very useful in a fight, then… so I can't use this as an escape mechanism._ Kame wrote off that theory in his mind.

Kumotensai wasn't finished. "However, for now I wish to ask you about yourself. I know from your trials that you have enough skill in combat and self-control, but what releases do you use? What techniques are you learning? What rank are you, and in what village? Give me a good idea of what sort of shinobi you are."

Kame thought for a little while before responding. "I use wind and fire releases, but in combat I usually rely on paperbombs and puppet jutsu." Kumotensai twitched when he mentioned puppet jutsu. "I was associated with Sunagakure, but after a friend of mine was sentenced to die I escaped with her to Otogakure. It was actually from Orochimaru that I initially received your contract."

Kumotensai chittered in an annoyed way. "Orochimaru must be the reason our contract has seen so little use in recent years, then… you mentioned puppet jutsu?"

"Yeah…" Kame narrowed his eyes. "Wait, do you know anything about it?"

"Yes, boy, it was from the spiders that early members of Sunagakure first learned the basics of puppet jutsu! It will be a pleasure to see how our techniques have evolved over the years."

Kame remembered how he'd left the Hidden Sound so suddenly and winced. _I should probably get back, huh? But, first…_ "I understand that I can't simply transport here and have to summon a spider to inform you, but I also don't feel right summoning a random one. Can I practice this chakra bonding you described with an easy summon, which I can use in the future for information purposes?" He realised that giant spiders would probably make other humans pretty nervous, and added: "Preferably a member of the trickster class, assuming they all use illusions to appear human?"

"Aww, missing me that much already?" Kame whirled around to see Kumokafu with her illusion back up. _She looks a lot like an adult Haku,_ he realized, trying not to think about what that might imply about his own desires.

"Hey- I mean, hello…" Kame stuttered, trying to look at her without seeing anything too closely.

"Hey, it's simple… just touch me and I'll do the rest, alright…?" _Why did she have to say it like that,_ thought Kame, but put his hand out nonetheless- and felt it held in another hand, surprisingly soft and cool. _What? That's not an illusion, it's a transformation…_

"Mhmm, this isn't a trick… think about what you missed out on, darling." Kumokafu's eyes glinted dangerously. "Now, can you feel it? The special connection between us?" Kame closed his eyes and felt… strange. He couldn't describe it to save his life, but it was almost like a sixth sense that was being filled with the sensation of her chakra. It felt like… warm shadows, the acceptance of death, temptation. _This is officially the weirdest day of my entire life,_ Kame decided.

"Alright, honey, now make sure to think of me whenever you use the summoning jutsu, mmkay?" Kumokafu cooed as she retreated off into the darkness of the spiders' realm.

Kame turned back to Kumotensai, thinking of one last thing he wanted to ask before he left. "My ancestor, Genno… what kind of person was he?"

The elder spider considered the question for long seconds before responding. "He was always seeking improvement and information. Much of the time he had a mask over his emotions, but his actions betrayed a deep loyalty to the people he cared about- he was even willing to destroy the entire Hidden Leaf village in order to save his home."

 _What!? Destroy the entire…_ "But how?"

Kumotensai made a strange clicking noise that reminded Kame of laughter. _I must be going crazy if I can make sense of these spiders' noises._ "I suppose it makes sense that the Hidden Leaf would cover it up- it would be an embarrassment if news were to get out that a single man nearly annihilated them. The Heat Devil Village sent Genno to infiltrate the Leaf, which he did easily and then, posing as a carpenter, hid paperbombs all over the village. The war ended before he managed to set them off, and he returned home to the ruins of his home. Years later, he came back to the Hidden Leaf with intent to finish what he'd started, but changed his mind and spared them."

 _He almost destroyed the Leaf by himself- no, he could have, but chose not to._ Kame was glad to see that, despite two of his heroes recently turning out to fail his (admittedly unrealistic) expectations, Genno actually proved to be _more_ impressive. _The Sand and Sound together couldn't even take them down…_

Kame nodded to Kumotensai. "Thanks." _I wonder if Haku knows where I went… wait a minute,_ he thought suspiciously, _did Orochimaru intend for me to die in the process of these tests? If I did, then he could tell Haku it was a horrible accident and then…_ _no._ He couldn't afford to be suspicious of their host, because losing Orochimaru's favor would be a death sentence for both him and Haku. _I have to do my best to just accept his will and survive in this situation._

"I'd like to head back to-" No sooner had the words left his mouth than another wrench to his chakra network tore him out of his senses.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

 _I am never going to get used to being summoned,_ Kame thought as he flopped to the floor in the same room he'd left. _How do the summon animals deal with it?_ It wasn't _painful_ , per se, but the feeling of being yanked by his chakra through space and time just felt wrong. As he straightened up, the room was empty of people- _Orochimaru and Haku left? What do I do now? I don't remember the way back to my room, and if I try to go deeper I might accidentally wander into something terrible…_

He remembered what he'd been told the day before and shouted, "Grandmother! I need your help!" Like a helpful spirit, she instantly appeared in the doorway to the room, smiling as widely as ever.

"What kind of help do you need, dearie?" _How does she do that? Does she have reverse summoning seals set up all around the base?_ Not for the first time, Kame considered the strangeness of the kindly old woman, especially in the service of Orochimaru- _Where is she from? Why is she working for Orochimaru? Is the kindness just a front?_

"I need to find Haku, do you know where she is…?" Kame asked hopefully.

"Oh, I know just about everything that goes on in this place, dearie. Don't worry, I can take you to your sweet little… friend." The way that she said 'friend' suggested that she thought there was more between Kame and Haku. Kame's immediate blush at that notion brought even more delight to her eyes. "You are just too cute…"

"Uh… can you take me to her?" Grandmother nodded and began walking forward, so Kame tagged along. "Also… why are you working for Orochimaru? You don't really seem like the type to…" _But I guess me and Haku aren't, either,_ he realized.

Grandmother just smiled sadly. "Don't worry about that…" They slipped into a silence that lasted for what felt like almost a mile of twisting hallways until finally they reached a doorway that she pointed into. "Here's where she is, with Lord Orochimaru." Kame nodded his appreciation and then stepped into the room.

Inside, Haku was laid out on a table facedown and Orochimaru was standing over her. Seeing her spread out and unmoving like she was, with the bandages on her back torn open, also taking into account the fact that Orochimaru was standing over her, and Kame's heart nearly stopped. _Haku… no…_ Her head was turned towards him, and her eyes were closed with her mouth slightly open, completely expressionless.

Orochimaru, for his part, simply looked up at Kame with passive eyes. "Oh, it's you. Sit down and keep silent, understood? This is a delicate process." Kame took a small, angry step forward before he saw that Haku was breathing. _Oh, this is…_

He sat down as Orochimaru had asked and fiddled nervously with his hands. Somehow, the travel back from Uebu Abyss had taken away the worst of his chakra exhaustion. _I still don't have much chakra left, but it's enough to not hamper me._ Kame noted down the side effect of the reverse summoning process in case it would be useful in the future.

Orochimaru had his hands hovering just above Haku's back, and her seal was exposed. Kame had always pictured jinchuriki seals as grids or bars of some sort, but hers was a spiral pattern. The outside end of the seal split into four lines that ran towards her limbs, but Kame couldn't see if…

Kame felt his face redden as he noticed that Haku was clad in _only_ bandages around her waist and upper body. He looked away quickly, studying the walls of the room and the floor, forcing himself to avoid glancing back towards his unconscious teammate. _It's wrong for me to take advantage of her while she's unconscious… who am I; Miriki?_ After an eternity where his self-control was tested far more than it had ever been before (but only a few lapses in restraint, all of which sent all the blood back to his face) Orochimaru finally hissed in satisfaction and spoke.

"You completed the trials of the spiders far more quickly than I'd assumed you would. How many of them did you successfully pass?"

Kame tried to keep the pride from his face as he turned to face the Sannin. "All of them that I attempted. I postponed the sage trials because they would have taken far too long, but passed all the other tests leading up to that."

Orochimaru looked… well, not quite impressed, but close. "Kidomaru was only capable of passing even a single one of the tests. You may prove less useless than him, then…"

Kame was admittedly curious. "If you know about the trials, then why haven't you attempted them? Isn't it possible to hold the summoning contracts of two different animals? Sasuke Uchiha has snakes and hawks, so for you to have only snakes-" He stopped talking when Orochimaru's expression grew angry. _Mental note: don't mention something another ninja does better than him._

"The spiders are a territorial species and hoard their power. The slugs will give their services away to anyone who shows kindness, the toads to anyone who shows strength of character, and the snakes respect only power. The spider contract has leaped from holder to holder because it has historically proven highly difficult to achieve any meaningful level of connection with them- As far as I am aware, only you and your ancestor Genno have passed the watcher class test. I never attempted their trials because a perquisite for even attempting them is to be unbound to any other contract. To risk my relationship with the snakes for almost a complete unknown was something I didn't want to risk, although one of my underlings attempted it." _Kidomaru, he said._

"Okay, I guess that makes sense, they were… strange to interact with." Kame thought about the hours he'd spent in their realm. "They seemed to have a lot of disdain for other animals and humans."

"It's said that in ancient times, they were forced to the very edges of the world by the other summon animals." Orochimaru sighed. "Such tales are unreliable, but their impact isn't negligible. Legends, while untrue, hold power over the weak-minded who believe in them."

Kame thought of the slumbering, massive Nakama, and didn't write off the spiders' story just yet. He started to speak again, but stopped when Haku suddenly pushed herself up onto her knees and turned to face Kame, face going from hazy confusion to horror as she looked down at the cut bandages being the only thing she was wearing. Kame choked on his words and slapped his hands over his face. Orochimaru let out an amused noise at the display of teenage awkwardness, but didn't make any comment.

Finally, Haku spoke. "Okay, I'm… you can look." Kame dropped his hands to see Haku wearing her top and skirt again, now in mint condition (Grandmother had stocked their cabinets with carbon copies of their original clothes). They were both uncomfortably unwilling to meet each others' eyes, so when Orochimaru spoke it was a huge relief to turn and look at him.

"I've analyzed the seal that the Kazekage put over you. It was similar in construction to Sankuryu's seal, but over time either due to the tentails' influence or your kekkeigenkai itself, the chakra of the seal has merged with your own chakra network. To destroy it now would undoubtedly kill you, and to remove the tentails would destroy it." Kame dared a quick glance over at Haku, who seemed shaken by the news. _She can't ever be rid of it…_

"Furthermore, it has developed a connection to your kekkeigenkai with… interesting results. The Yorutsume kekkeigenkai was always of interest to me, but due to your clan's secretive nature and small size, it was difficult for me to find a living specimen to study…" Orochimaru eyes flashed in triumph as he looked towards Haku. "As I had guessed, the kekkeigenkai is neither visual nor nature-change oriented, but instead grants the user the ability to consume chakra. My brief studies indicated that this only worked for chakra still within the body or chakra used without any nature change, but after watching you in the chunin exams I believe you have found a way to broaden its uses."

"But isn't that what the tentails…" Kame trailed off as Orochimaru sighed.

"As I was saying before you interrupted me, the kekkeigenkai steals the chakra of the surrounding area and of other people and converts it for personal use. On what scale and how quickly most likely rely on how strongly it has been inherited. The tentails displayed similar traits when it came active, and after investigating the exact nature of what is sealed inside you I have come to conclude that you are not its full jinchuriki." _Gaara and Deihaka did say that it was a part of the tentails that was sealed inside her, not the full tentails itself._

"When it was summoned during the Fourth Shinobi World War, the tentails displayed a willingness to follow the orders of its jinchuriki, but besides that seemed to have no real thought besides hunger for the chakra of the gathered shinobi. In the fragment of it that is trapped inside Haku, these problems seem to have been exacerbated by the seal and her kekkeigenkai until all that is left is a hungering void of chakra inside her. It may possess some ability to communicate and reason, but its only driving motivation is to consume the chakra of everything around it in a futile attempt to reconstruct itself." Haku made an unhappy noise.

"However, while you may not be able to bond with it, I believe that you should be able to hold it in check through force of will." Kame restrained himself from snapping at the man, upset that he would present Haku with that course at all. _She's suffered enough from trying to control it._ "Allowing smaller amounts of its power through, as long as you can maintain control, could prove extremely effective. While your kekkeigenkai is useful, it has its limits- in the tentails state, those limits are gone, making almost all forms of jutsu useless against you. Keep in mind, though, that if you allow too much of it out, it may never come back in. If all ten tails were to emerge, the result would be a hungering monstrosity that would consume everything in its path and grow in power with everything it ate until it died or killed everything."

 _That's… the Tanikage managed to stop her somehow, but after only seven tails she surprised and took out Naruto and Sasuke. If she loses control again, I doubt that…_ "I won't risk it," Haku said firmly. "If I give it any hold on me, it will claw and fight until it has control."

Orochimaru leaned back against the wall, responding with disappointment in his tone. "I do hope you will reconsider- the power to take on multiple Kage is well worth some risk-"

"Thank you, Lord Orochimaru, but…" Haku looked down. "I've let the tentails out twice, and both times I killed people I cared about."

Orochimaru sighed. "Very well, then I won't train you to use it… for now." Before Haku or Kame could protest the addition, he continued. "That said, both of you have cursemarks that I _will_ teach you to use. Follow me to the testing room." Kame and Haku had little choice but to do as he asked and fall into line behind him as they went back to where they'd started that morning. On the way, Kame glanced over at Haku- she seemed to have taken the news about how inescapable the tentails' grasp was fairly well, but after that night at the Hasagi ramen shop he was always second-guessing his ability to read her emotions. She noticed his stare and smiled curiously at him, making him blush and look away. _I need to stop doing this._

Finally, they reached the training room and Orochimaru turned back to them. "I've improved my cursemarks much over the years, and now the survival rate of their application is up to eighty percent." _Wait, what? He gambled my life on a-_ "You two survived and took to them well, so we can begin training with them now." _He threw me into the Uebu Abyss without any warning, either… I feel like he's being a little casual with my life._

"Now, the cursemark has quite a few utilitarian uses like keeping track of your status and location, but in combat it serves the purpose of granting extreme power for a short duration, with a cost at the end. In your cases, at the end of stage one you will be fatigued and weakened, while stage two will leave you chakra-exhausted and unable to continue fighting. In addition, stage two of the cursemarks tends to have… physical side-effects, although they vary from person to person." _I don't like the sound of that_ , Kame thought.

"Haku," he said, turning to face her, "I gave you a Death cursemark to supplement your fighting style. In stage one, it will drain a moderate amount of chakra to speed up your perception of time, essentially giving you near-instant reflexes. In stage two, it drains a massive amount of chakra to temporarily increase your speed to the point where everything else appears to be standing still. The mark doesn't give you any chakra, but you already have several ways to gain it on your own."

He turned to face Kame. "You, on the other hand, have a Life cursemark. Innately, it senses and absorbs nature chakra from around you to form a stored supply. Stage one will use that supply and connection to natural world to grant you the ability to both see and comprehend chakra all around you. Stage two will allow you to manipulate both your chakra and the stored chakra freely, moving, applying change of natures, or attaching it as you see fit."

 _Why would he give us so much power for free?_ Kame's confusion over the last few days boiled over. _He kept Haku alive despite knowing that she wasn't a real jinchuriki, and even accepted her decision not to use the tentails. He's given me a summon contract and a cursemark without any strings attached- this is not the Orochimaru I read about, who destroyed lives and hoarded everything he could in a mad quest for power._ "You didn't destroy the Village Hidden in the Sound, did you?" It came out as more of a statement than a question.

Orochimaru looked at him, face an emotionless mask. However, the slight quaver of his voice betrayed strong emotions concealed below: "No, I didn't."


	26. Arc 3 Vol 4: Intimidation

**(A/N) I'm not sure if Gaara still canonically has Shukaku, but I'm saying that if he did lose it then later (when it reformed) he went out and got it back. Also, _Breakthrough_ is up there with _Ft._ and _Snow Fairy_.**

 **Bingo Book Entry: Hiretsuna**

Threat Level: S  
Ninjutsu: 8/10  
Genjutsu: 6/10  
Taijutsu: 4/10

Village of Origin: ?  
Status: Flee On Sight (chunin or lower) Attack On Sight (jonin or higher)  
Known Crimes: Murders (252)

Combat Style: Mid-range ninjutsu user. Uses slime and acid. Two stages of power-up, first from cursemark and second from (presumably) the sixtails.

Notes: Unknown village of origin. Old reports indicate he was a B-rank criminal, but after meeting with Orochimaru bumped up to an A-rank due to cursemark. Believed to be the jinchuriki of Saiken the sixtails, created by Orochimaru when the tailed beast reformed and increasing his status to S-rank.

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The next few weeks went by unbelievably quickly, almost a blur to Kame as he worked on bonding with the spiders, practicing puppetry, and (failingly) learning to use his cursemark. While Kame was unable to even get stage one, Haku had managed to unlock her second stage almost immediately and now spent almost all of her time training with whichever one of the Sound Ninja Four was at the base. The size increase, horns, fangs, and claws that emerged when she used the mark had taken some getting used to, but now he simply saw them as another one of her characteristics (if that made any sense).

Besides the disgruntled, middle-aged Himei, there were three others that Kame got to meet: Sankuryu, who behind the mask was actually a twenty-something year old man with black hair and eyes, wearing a Hidden Stone headband with a line scratched through it. In person, he was just as off-putting, always restrained and speaking very little- although, Kame suspected that the missing-ninja had taken a liking to Haku, because whenever she wanted to train with him he was always ready to go.

Another one was Seikaku, a perpetually blindfolded woman of indiscernible age, very thin and with long brown hair. Something about her seemed familiar, but given that she was even less keen on speaking than Sankuryu was, Kame didn't have a chance to pursue his curiosity. The final member of the four was a large, greasy, fat man called Hiretsuna, who spoke far more than anyone wanted him to, usually about terrible things. Of all the people Kame had met in the Hidden Sound, only Hiretsuna was what he had expected: a man who boasted about killing and seemed to enjoy human suffering. His stringy green hair and yellowed teeth disgusted Kame almost as much as his attitude.

Midway through the month, he'd approached Kame and Haku with a wide grin splitting his face and brandishing a booklet. "Here ya go, kiddos. It's official- yer one of us now!" He'd then wandered off, cackling to himself, while Kame looked at the book. There was blood and something else splattered on the cover- _Did Hiretsuna kill someone to take this? No, who am I kidding, of course he did. Wait, this is the newest international bingo book… I wonder if…_

They flipped through to the end and found what he'd been dreading, entries for him and Haku. Kame was listed as a C-class missing ninja with a reward of two hundred thousand ryo on his head and standard orders to attack on sight. _Ouch,_ he thought, _only C-class? Come on, I'm at least-_ then he remembered his first mission, and being confused when an enemy ninja had cared about their rank. _Oh, now I get it._ It took longer to find Haku, because she actually wasn't listed among the C or D class missing-ninja. She was listed as A-class, a reward of four million ryo on her head and standing orders to 'capture on sight, retreat at first sign of tentails.' However, their sadness at the visual confirmation of their betrayal was immediately replaced with glee at having a complete list of all the official missing-ninja. While not explicitly forbidden, children were discouraged from reading the bingo books, and neither Kame nor Haku had ever had a chance to get their hands on one of the elusive things.

It served as good entertainment when they weren't training- which is to say, a very small amount of the time. After nearly a month of the nonstop training, Kame began to grow impressed with his own growth, but also apprehensive of when Orochimaru would decide to send them out. Every time the sannin requested their presence, Kame was sure that the order would come: to kill an innocent person, to burn a village, or to tear a family apart… he wasn't afraid that he wouldn't be able to do it, he was afraid because he knew that he _would_ do it.

Finally, the day came. After training with the spiders and returning for his cursemark training, he found Orochimaru waiting with Hiretsuna and Seikaku standing behind him. As Haku came into the room as well, he nodded and spoke. "You have trained… enough. Your first task is to begin immediately."

Kame forced himself to ask the dreaded question. "What… what is… who do we have to kill?"

Hiretsuna laughed at that. "Kill? I wish, kid, but nah, this one's just a boring-"

Orochimaru raised a hand to silence the obese man. "If things go according to plan, we will not have to kill anyone. If things go awry, as they always seem to, then you two, Hiretsuna, and Seikaku will assist me in the murder of several Kage. There will be a-"

 _What._ Kame had to take a few moments to register what Orochimaru had said, but when he found his voice he more than made up for the lost time: "What? How do you expect me and Haku to take on Kage!? We're strong but not that strong and if you expect her to use the tentails after she said she wouldn't and we're criminals so the Kage would never just meet us so then are we-" he had to pause for breath, which was long enough for Orochimaru to reassume control.

"Interrupt me again and you won't be able to speak for several days." Kame nodded, subdued. "We are not entering this meeting with the intent of killing the Kage, merely of discussing matters of… common interest. The larger villages, with their power balances and hunger for tailed beasts, will not be present."

"Then who?" Haku asked.

"The Hidden Rain, Hidden Stone, Hidden Grass, Hidden Waterfall, Hidden Sound, Hidden Star, and Hidden Whirlpool villages have called a summit." _Hidden Sound? So is Orochimaru still counted as a Kage of a village that no longer exists?_ "You two will accompany me to this meeting, and perhaps even go to some of these villages as emissaries." _No killing, so… as far as first missions go, I guess this one is all right._

"Okay, Lord Orochimaru. But…" Kame wasn't sure how to say what he wanted to without risking the unpredictable and insane missing-ninja's anger. "Uh… why Hiretsuna? This is a diplomatic mission, right?" At the sight of Hiretsuna narrowing his eyes, Kame backtracked rapidly. "I mean, I'm sorry, it's just that you seem to enjoy and be skilled at killing, so for you to be included in a mission that doesn't involve it is…" _Stop babbling like an idiot, Kame._

Hiretsuna winked at him. "See, this kid gets it. Now, if we just went _straight_ to the killing, then I would understand. Oh, and by the way, loving the attitude; you get ten suck-up points."

Orochimaru's mouth twitched a little bit towards a smile, but immediately returned to a look of deadly seriousness. "Hiretsuna is essential in our negotiations." Kame wanted to ask further, but the man was already flashing through a set of seals. "Now, we've wasted enough valuable time. During the summit, remain silent and do not speak unless _I_ specifically order you to, understood?" Kame and Haku both nodded. "Excellent. Now, Group Reverse Summoning Jutsu!"

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 _I am never, ever going to get used to that,_ Kame thought as the reverse summoning spat him out in a dark room. _Whoever invented it clearly had no idea of how it would feel to get grabbed by your spirit and then pulled across the world in milliseconds._ He straightened up to see Orochimaru already stepping forward up to a doorway, Hiretsuna and Seikaku following behind him. Once the doorway opened and all five of their group stepped through it, Kame froze up a little bit- they stood in a round room, arrayed in a circle about a table with seven spaces, and in the spaces sat Kage.

Kame could see that each Kage's seat had a symbol carved on the stone table before it, which he used to identify them. To the left, the Takikage of the Hidden Waterfall was smiling faintly and staring off into space, seemingly completely zoned out of whatever was happening in the room. He looked positively ancient, the oldest person Kame had ever seen, with a long, trailing beard and a full head of white hair. Behind him stood three Waterfall ninja dressed in black robes, with scythes strapped to their backs. All of them wore another symbol emblazoned on their clothing- _Wait, I know that. The upside-down triangle inside a circle… where have I seen that before…_

As Orochimaru took his seat, Kame's eyes drifted over to the woman to their right, the Hoshikage of the Hidden Star village. The woman had short-cut blue hair and piercing yellow eyes that were perpetually narrowed in discontent. She looked deadly serious, glancing around the room distrustfully. _Probably warranted,_ Kame thought, _considering she's the only one who didn't bring guards._

To the right of her sat the Jettokage of the Hidden Whirlpool village, a tired-looking bald man with sunken eyes. He had two shinobi standing behind him, although they were fully cloaked with all of their features hidden under heavy black robes and hoods. The last occupant, directly across the table from them, was the Amekage of the Hidden Rain- probably the strangest occupant of the room. His face was hidden behind an intricately carved steel mask, and the one hand he had on the table appeared to be some sort of mechanical prosthetic. His four followers, all dressed in the same Rain uniform, wearing the same ANBU masks, and standing with the exact same posture, were completely unmoving. _Humans don't stand that still. Either their training must be intense, or…_

The Hoshikage broke the silent standoff. "Alright, with you here, Otokage, that just leaves the Grass and Stone representatives. What's taking those idiots so long?"

A reply came instantly when she finished talking in a measured and evenly paced voice from the Amekage. "They will not be coming. Their villages and people have been assimilated."

The room broke out into a clamor as everyone responded differently, but calmed down until Orochimaru had the floor. "Do you have proof of these claims? The Stone and Grass wouldn't just fall overnight, and especially not without _someone_ hearing about it."

Again with the immediate response, the Amekage showed no hint of any emotion. "The villages remain intact. It is their leaders who have been converted to join us. Soon they will announce an official merger between our three lands." He raised a hand, and two of his followers stepped forward and removed the masks to show their faces. Kame had never seen the Kage of the Hidden Grass or Stone, but the collective responses told him all he needed to know.

"Amekage, did you plan to inform us of your plans to absorb two other villages?" The Hoshikage looked extraordinarily annoyed.

"It was unnecessary."

The Takikage suddenly leaned forward and narrowed his eyes at the two ex-Kage before speaking in a oddly gleeful voice. "This is an affront. If you don't get those _perversions_ out of my sight, I will-" _No, that's not gleeful, it's… zealous?_

Orochimaru slammed a hand on the table. "Enough!" As all four of the other Kage turned to him with disbelief that he would dare to order them around, he continued talking. "The Hidden Rain's military movements, at least for now, are not relevant to the subject of our discussion. In fact, this may well be a turn of events that help us all in our true objective." No one spoke to challenge him yet. "The Tanikage is far stronger than I anticipated." _What does the Hidden Valley have to do with this?_

"Bah, you're just talking him up 'cause you lost to him." The Hoshikage was completely unimpressed.

Orochimaru turned sharply towards her and dropped into a threatening tone. "Let us not forget that I am the only one here with not one but _two_ jinchuriki."

The other Kage all looked taken aback when he mentioned having two of them, while Kame was just confused. _Two? Who's the other one, besides Haku?_ The Amekage didn't move from his position, but the voice trailed from the mask, still impassive. "How did this come to happen?"

Orochimaru pointed at Haku. "She is the jinchuriki of the tentails who attacked the chunin exams, loyal to me now. As you can see-"

He was cut off when the Hoshikage raised a hand and a laser streamed forward from it, crossing the room instantly towards where Haku stood. Kame's heart skipped a beat as he saw it punch a hole in the wall behind her. _Haku…_ but she was unharmed, having dodged to the side, her spiraling cursemark having spread out onto her body. _Stage one let her dodge it in time, thank god._ At the sight that Haku had avoided her attack, the Hoshikage made a noise of disgust and sat back further in her chair.

Orochimaru raised an eyebrow. "Do you really think that wise when I have both of my jinchuriki in this room?" _Does that mean Seikaku is a jinchuriki? Or- god forbid- Hiretsuna...?_

Hiretsuna smirked and leaned forward. "Just say the word, Lord Orochimaru. I bet she'll drop the damn smirk if I melt it off her face…" A wide grin showed all of his yellowed and uneven teeth. _So it is him. I remember there being a slug tailed beast, right?_

The Hoshikage was unimpressed. "I was testing your claims."

"Well, now that you have finished your testing, we should proceed." The Hoshikage didn't make any more offensive moves, so Orochimaru continued. "The Tanikage was able to use the Domination on even a jinchuriki, ruling out that plan. Our only remaining option is a combined assault, which-"

The Jettokage spoke for the first time, his voice coming out pained as though he was fighting an injury. "-will happen after we finish our primary objective in this alliance."

The Amekage chimed in. "First, we must attack and gain control over the great nations. Then, you may have your revenge on the Hidden Valley village."

"By then, it may be too late." Orochimaru spread his hands in a gesture of diplomacy. "The Tanikage has already wiped out three lesser villages, and my spies have word that he is planning to strike again. Any of you could be his target."

"We will not take further action until the Hidden Sand has been assimilated." The Amekage moved for the first time, leaning back and removing his hand from the table in finality.

"Neither will the Hidden Star." The Hoshikage crossed her arms.

"My Lord's will is for the Hidden Stone to be purged." The elderly Takikage grinned widely and spread his hands in a helpless gesture. "I will not aid you in any war until His earlier command is made reality."

The Jettokage remained silent, but with the three denials Orochimaru bitterly sat back and hissed in annoyance. "You all fail to see the immediate danger."

The Hoshikage scowled. "No, _you_ fail to understand how the great villages have sucked away all of the ninja work. In times of peace, there is little enough to go around, and when clients from our land go to the Hidden Cloud-"

Orochimaru talked right over her, turning towards the Amekage. "When will you begin your assault upon the Hidden Sand?"

"When the necessary strength has been gathered."

"And how long will that take?"

"It will change depending on available ninja work, as well as any developments that would aid construct production."

Orochimaru was clearly annoyed, but sat back and nodded nonetheless. "When you have a set time, inform the alliance. I'm sure that several of the people here would be willing to aid you in return for future reciprocation." The Amekage nodded, a fast and controlled movement. "Does anyone else have any plans they wish to put forward?" Nobody spoke. "Then I will return to the Hidden Sound."

Orochimaru made a handsign and the room disappeared. _Oh no, not again-_

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As they arrived back in the Hidden Sound, Kame suddenly felt a massive wave of emotions come crashing down onto him. _Wait… those were Hidden Villages, legitimate Hidden Villages, who were plotting with Orochimaru to destroy the Sand. Orochimaru even promised to help the Hidden Rain in their attack!_ Kame rose to his feet quickly and whipped around to face Orochimaru. "You never said anything about attacking the Hidden Sand!"

"Tread carefully, Kame…" Orochimaru's tone was dangerous, but Kame didn't care.

"You used Haku like a weapon. Are you going to try to use her against Gaara, too? Set her off in the town like a bomb? You're conspiring with dangerous villages full of shinobi to start a massive war!" Kame thought about what had happened in that room. _Why wasn't I upset? They were… wait…_ "You put me in a genjutsu to repress my emotions, didn't you!?"

Orochimaru narrowed his eyes. "Ignoring your incredibly insubordinate tone for the moment, you have no idea what you're talking about. I am in that alliance because I require their assistance to take out the Hidden Valley village, and-"

"Why!? The Tanikage was the one who managed to stop Haku from killing all those people! I've only met a few people from that village, but they've all been good. I can't believe you would destroy the great nations just to kill one specific, innocent village, and-"

Kame stopped talking when a snake shot from Orochimaru's sleeve and wrapped around his neck, cutting off most of his airflow and lifting him off the ground. Another snake bound his arms and another one his legs, leaving him hanging there and unable to do anything but struggle. Orochimaru's killing intent swamped through the room, and his voice took on a dark tone. "You seem to have forgotten who you're speaking to, you insolent little child. I have killed more innocent shinobi in my lifetime than would fit inside the Hidden Valley village and I will likely kill that many again.

"You presume to question my decisions? To reprimand me in my own base?" A searing pain tore through the cursemark while Kame's struggles grew weaker from lack of oxygen. "You are not my advisor, not my _equal_. You are nothing but a villageless shinobi that I used to get what I want, and like all the other shinobi I have used, once I can done with you I will leave you behind. If you _ever_ challenge me again, I will kill you." Kame's vision grew spotty, but the snakes receded and dumped him onto the floor. He gasped for air as the searing pain retreated slowly into his cursemark.

He heard Orochimaru and the other shinobi leave the room, but still didn't move from his sitting position on the floor. Once he was sure that there was no noise from anyone left in the room, he curled up his knees to his chest and allowed the first little sob out to join the tears streaking down his cheeks. Like a dam inside him had broken, Kame began crying in earnest, hating himself for it but unable to stop. _I was so stupid to think that things were going to be okay. I lied to myself about this place, about these people, about what was going to happen. I dumped Haku and myself into this mess because I couldn't face reality. Orochimaru isn't secretly a nice guy, he's always been this way, and I just failed to-_

Kame's thoughts were cut off as Haku moved from hiding behind him to sit down and wrap her arms around his body, legs trailing off to the sides and head resting on his shoulder. She spoke softly, reassuringly: "I've been so selfish… I should've been paying more attention to what _you_ felt. I leaned on you before, but now you can lean on me. We can get through this if we just rely on each other, instead of you shouldering all my pain and getting nothing in return."

 _No, that's not true,_ Kame wanted to say, but his voice failed him. _I never had it as bad as you, and you shouldn't worry about me._ However, instead what came out of his mouth was a quiet, mumbled, "Thanks."

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"Now, Kame, pull harder on the cursemark. Grab the power and take it." Orochimaru's tone was the same as always, lazy on the surface but with an undercurrent of malice, showing no sign that he even remembered the previous day's events. Kame reached inside himself and felt the cursemark. _I have to do this._ The cursemark, though, was… _it's like I'm shoving my arm down into a hole, but the thing I want is just outside where I can reach._ He strained harder and harder, but like every other time he'd tried to do it, the power retreated more and more the closer he got to it. "Kame!"

The Sannin's raised voice sent a pang through Kame's mind, a memory of his punishment last night, and in his panic he pushed forward out of his comfort zone, more than he'd known he could. Something inside him snapped and then snapped again, and suddenly, his field of view shattered into brilliant colors. _What the hell… am I going crazy!?_

Orochimaru smiled his dead-eyed smile. "Finally- you even went straight through stage one to stage two. Now, this is the first time I have attempted this particular cursemark, so tell me what you are seeing."

"I'm… I'm not _seeing._ " It wasn't Kame's vision that had changed, it was almost as if a _new_ sense had opened up inside of him. The same sort of feeling that he got when he bonded with a summon animal was filling up his mind from all directions, giving him complete sensory overload. The floor, the walls, they all shined and screamed and stank more intensely than he could cope with. Orochimaru was like a brilliant sun, far too much for him to even be near, much less look into.

"It's… is this chakra?" As seconds went on, the feelings dulled. The new sensations grew weaker until Kame could think again. _It's like I was in the dark for my whole life, and then I saw the light for the first time. If I get like this every single time I activate it, then…_ "I can feel the chakra around me, somehow, the ambient stuff all over the place. It was overpowering at first, but now I can manage it… better." He turned his inner eye to face Orochimaru and winced once more as the Sannin's signature remained too strong to look at, at least for a few seconds.

"Do you feel any side effects? Try to describe what you are going through to me."

Orochimaru had a _lot_ of chakra. "I'm focusing on you… you have a strong signature, a lot of chakra… the area around me is weaker. Haku is…" Kame trailed off, at a loss for words to describe what his friend's chakra looked like. "Haku is blank. She doesn't even _have_ a chakra signature… although, inside her, I can sense…" The tentails, or the chakra-hungry fragment of it, was a black vortex that threatened to suck him in.

"What about your own chakra? In stage two, you should be able to manipulate it at will now." Kame felt within himself. _This is somehow even stranger. It's like… it's like a new limb._ He tried to push out the chakra in a line before him and it gingerly reached forward. _Okay, now to the left._ The chakra curved off to the side. He reached forward and prodded Orochimaru with it, trying to see if the Sannin would react.

Orochimaru looked down to where their chakra met. "Good, I can feel that. Now that you've opened up stage one _and_ stage two, you should be able to feel and move your chakra. We will resume these lessons tomorrow." Wordlessly, he sank down into the floor, leaving Kame and Haku in the room. _I guess it's time to go practice with the spiders,_ Kame thought. He turned to summon Kumokafu, but froze when he saw Haku staring at him.

"What?"

Haku seemed to escape her stupor and point at him. "You're… the cursemark made you…" she gathered herself. "The cursemark made your skin white, gave you little horns, and… you have…" she trailed off, just pointing at him.

"What is it?" Kame was afraid now, wondering if he had grown antenna or wings or something.

"You have six more eyes…"

 _What? Oh, no…_ he reached up to his head and moved his hands around, feeling the small baby-goat horns that poked from his hair in rows, but passed over them to pat around his forehead. "Why…" The six round, smooth growths seemed to be arrayed one above, one to the side, and one diagonal to each of his real eyes.

"What? They're not that bad, you know…" Haku smiled at him. "At least you don't grow two feet."

"Says you!" It was petty, but Kame wasn't about to admit defeat. "You get cool horns and a tail and claws, and I get to look like a bug!"

Haku scowled at him, crossing her arms, and then shot up a foot as she engaged the second stage of her cursemark. _What? Over this stupid little argument, she's going to put herself out of commission for the afternoon?_ The less a person exerted themselves, the lower the repercussions after the cursemark ran out of energy, but that was only effective up to a certain point- no matter what, a majority of the user's chakra would be drained. _Still, now that it's active, I know for a fact that I have it worse_.

In the second stage, Haku was actually more than a foot taller, nearly two feet. Given that she was five-foot-two (the same height as Kame) without it, with it activated she towered over him. _Wait, why did her clothes grow with her- is it actually a transformation effect rather than a body alteration effect?_ Her hands and feet became clawed, her teeth changed into fangs, and long horns ran almost a foot and a half long, starting from just behind her forehead. Her skin became black and her hair grew longer. _I don't think Orochimaru went so far as to specifically design the transformation… so is it dictated by the person themselves? Or by something in their genetic makeup?_

 _Either way, I clearly win this argument._ "See, it makes you look like a badass dragon. I look like an albino spider! This isn't even a discussion."

Haku shook her head. "I'm seven feet tall! And I look like a scary demon!"

"I look stupid! Who's intimidated or amazed by a _spider_!? I'm probably more scary than you, too- I've got bumpy stuff growing all over my head. Plus, you're still super pretty even with all that… stuff…" _Oh no, I said too much…_ Haku blushed, which looked strange coming from the massive demonic figure, and Kame decided to get out of the situation as soon as possible. "Summoning Jutsu!"

As the smoke cloud cleared, Kumokafu's form emerged. "Well, hey there, handsome. Say, you look a lot more… spider-ey… than usual, but I'm not complaining. Wait, who is-" She turned to take in Haku, then moved a lock of her own purple hair to look at, comparing her hair color with Haku's, and then turned towards Kame with a shit-eating grin on her face. _Shit, she knows…_

Thankfully, Haku seemed too distracted by his earlier compliment to notice, so he seized his chance. "Hey, Kumokafu, no time to chat, I need to go to the Uebu Abyss." She nodded, making one last knowing glance towards Haku and then back at him, before disappearing.

 _Wait, if I run out of power, then…_ memories of the harsh scolding he'd received from Kankuro came to mind, and he frowned. _Well, if I have more chakra control when I'm like this, then maybe, just maybe…_ He tried to release the seal's power before using it all up, allowing the new chakra to seep back into it. After enough of it returned, he felt the physical alterations drop away and watched his skin return to a normal color. However, the sixth sense remained, as did the widely spread seal. _Well, that's useful if I end up with extra chakra after being pushed into this state, I guess. Although, I don't think I can drop out of this mode, only from stage two down to stage one._ Haku looked at something behind him and waved happily.

Sankuryu appeared in the doorway. With stage one still active, Kame could see that the Sound ninja had the same emptiness as Haku, a void of black surrounded by the dim but present chakra of the natural world. He took her in with coolly appraising eyes, then nodded and began to activate his own cursemark. The last thing Kame saw before vanishing was Sankuryu striding forward in the mantis-like form of his second stage.


	27. Arc 3 Vol 5: Shaky Alliance

**Bingo Book Entry: Sankuryu**

Threat Level: S  
Ninjutsu: 5/10  
Genjutsu: 2/10  
Taijutsu: 10/10

Village of Origin: Hidden Stone  
Status: Attack On Sight  
Known Crimes: Treason, Murders (74), Kidnappings (41)

Combat Style: Taijutsu specialist, unseen to use jutsu (perhaps incapable?), deadly at short ranges, possesses some form of ranged attack (type unknown)

Notes: Hidden Stone report lists that he betrayed the village for Orochimaru. Apparently the sole user of a lost taijutsu technique. Never been seen using jutsu, possibly incapable of doing so. Merciless but doesn't go out of his way to kill people. Do not engage in taijutsu under any circumstances.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Kame casually strolled along the webbing, not fazed anymore by the heights or the spiders (his time here had accomplished at least that, if not much else). Over the last month, he'd found that connecting with most of the spiders wasn't as easy as doing it with the spiders whose trials he'd passed. Specific summoning bonds were formed from a deep and mutual respect, which had been created as he succeeded in the spiders' trials. Kumogado the crafter, Kumokafu the trickster, Kumokotto the fighter, and Kumojiken the watcher were all summonable for him, now.

However, that was overstating things. Kumogado had very little combat or utility uses, and was in fact chosen by the weavers because he was popular among them. Kumojiken was constantly unavailable to be summoned because of his obligations as a leader among the watchers, while Kumokotto was unavailable due to having to defend the Depths. In fact, most of the combat class was occupied there, limiting Kame's summon options. He'd searched around the Uebu Abyss' layers, but most of the spiders had either dismissed him or avoided him. Those who had agreed to attempt the summoning bond all either didn't respect him or didn't have his respect.

In the entire month that had passed since starting his contract, Kame had failed to get even a single spider summon, and was afraid to make a generalized summon like most other contract holders would. Kumotensai had warned him that such an attempt would risk pulling out an Eater, which would immediately turn on him. _Is it just me, or is this contract significantly more of a pain in the ass than the other ones I've read about?_

Eventually, he moved up to the level of the trickster class, seeing the black and red spiders of varying sizes moving about in their smaller webs. _The webs here are strange,_ he thought. _It's all based around one huge web underneath Nakama, with other webs that get smaller and smaller built over it, on top of all the huge chunks of rubble and spires that it catches. Her web marks the bottom of the civilized spiders' domain, and above it there are layers for each of the classes. But- the webs aren't really organized by size, and neither are the classes themselves._

 _It's probably time to get back again, isn't it?_ Kame sighed, turning back towards the longer strand that would take him to Kumotensai. Before he could start walking, though, a small form came flying down to land on the web in front of him.

 _What the hell? This thing is tiny_ , Kame thought, narrowing his eyes at it. Unlike the other massive spiders he'd seen in the abyss, this newest one was only maybe six inches from one side to the other. It squeaked at him in a… not angry, but loud and intense voice. "You! I heard that you got picked as the summoner, but I don't believe it!"

Kame narrowed his eyes. The spider had the black body of the trickster class, but the bands at its joints and around its eyes were the orange of the combat class. _Why is it so small?_ It was literally shuddering with either rage or excitement, causing the web to vibrate just a little. "Well!? Fight me, human! I don't accept you as my master!"

"No." Kame didn't let his guard down, but also didn't accept the challenge.

"What!?" The spider waved one little leg at him. "You're not gonna fight me because I'm too small!? Well, I'll show you-"

Kame sighed. "No, I'm not gonna fight you because _you're_ challenging _me_. I'm a hundred times your size, which means you're probably hiding some way to deal with me." The spider stopped shaking for a moment. "I don't want to risk fighting something a lot stronger than me for no good reason."

"You think I'm stronger than you?" the spider asked wonderingly, before returning to its aggressive original tone. "I mean, of course I am! I'm Kumohiro, the strongest damn spider in the Uebu Abyss!"

Kame raised an eyebrow. "Really? The strongest?"

The spider went back to shaking. "Yeah! What, do you think I'm bluffing?"

"Well, now I kind of do-" Kame had dropped his defensiveness bit by bit, which turned out to be a mistake as the little spider shrieked in rage and then _disappeared._ "What? Where did you-" He whipped around at the feeling of something touching the back of his leg, but it turned out to be a drifting piece of web that led up to somewhere above him. _Ugh, this is way too-_

Kame turned around to see Kumohiro dangling about half an inch away from his face. His heart skipped _several_ beats and he jolted backwards in a blind panic. In the second instance of him growing too accustomed to the spiders' world, he forgot that to jump backwards was also to jump off of the web he was standing on. _Oh, shit…_

After a brief cartoonish moment of floating, gravity kicked in and yanked him downwards. _Alright, Kame, think. There has to be some way to stop yourself, right?_ He looked down and saw that he was already passing through the layer of the weaver class. _Shit, shit, shit…_ for the first time, he saw the web of Nakama and a small hint of wonder cut through his panic. _Wow, that's just… wow._ The spiders' goddess had a web that was easily thirty feet thick and stretched further than he could see in any direction. His still-stage-one-enhanced eyes saw it glowing like a beacon, full of more chakra than he'd ever seen.

Then his mind reminded him that said web was probably his only chance to avoid falling into the realm of the 'Eaters'. _The way the other spiders talk about them, I really don't think I want to know any more…_ Kame narrowed his eyes and concentrated chakra in his feet, then… "Wind Style: Wind Cushion Jutsu!" The burst of air threw him sideways and just before hitting the web, he activated it a second time to slow his fall, finally landing chest-first.

Some last minute instinct had him pushing all of his chakra out into the web from all over his body. It was enough to stick him on while he got his bearings, then he slowly released himself and rose painfully to his feet. _Okay, I managed to stop myself before-_

Then he saw the long, grey leg reach around the other side of the web, dragging forward a new kind of spider. While the other spiders all vaguely resembled real-life spiders in form if not in size, this thing was unnatural in almost every way. Long legs that got significantly thicker at the joints twisted in multiple directions, all supporting a small central body with no abdomen and jaws far too large. The mouth opened in a chittering hiss, revealing row after row of sharpened teeth. _Is this an Eater?_

To his credit, Kame didn't freeze up in fear. Instead, he did the opposite and sprinted off to his right as fast as he could. The clacking behind him told him that the Eater was still following him, so he kept going at top speed. _Wait, I can probably just stick it to the web, right?_ Kame dropped a hand into the web and tried to feed chakra into it… to no avail. It was too thick, its innate chakra far too strong for him to affect it in any real way. Even worse, the act of stopping and touching the web gave the Eater a chance to catch up.

 _Damn it. Both of my ninjutsu would throw me off of the web, it's too close for paperbombs, and there are no substitution targets._ Kame rolled away from a leg that shot forward to impale him and returned to his run, only to see a blur of orange streak by him. _What? What was that?_

He turned around just in time to see a small combat-class (maybe six or seven feet wide) leap into the air and spin over the Eater, whirling its legs. There was a brief pause, and then the Eater gurgled and collapsed. All eight of its legs separated from its body, and then all of the pieces dropped into the Depths. Kame opened his mouth to thank his savior, but the armored spider was already approaching and chastising him in an authoritative man's voice: "You're the summoner, yeah? Why are you here!?"

"I, uh… I fell off of the web-"

"You're our summoner and you fell off the damn web… well, that's new one. Wait a second, let me just-" another Eater came up from below the web and the orange spider darted towards it. The grey monster attacked, but the smaller spider's attack was only a feint and he was already in the air above his target. In another flash of spinning and striking legs, the Eater was dispatched into the Depths. _The other spiders talked about the Eaters with fear, so… this orange one must be super tough._ "Well? You just… fell off?"

Kame was reminded a little _too_ much of Kankuro's lectures and defended himself instinctively. "Hey! It's not my fault, Kumohiro scared me off of the-"

"Hiro!?" The orange spider lost composure. "What has that brat of mine done this time?" _This is Kumohiro's dad? I guess his size would make marrying a trickster class spider possible, which would explain Hiro's markings from both the combat and trickster classes… plus, him being a child would explain why he was so small…_ "Did the little monster challenge you to a fight?"

"Yeah…" Kame shrugged. "It wasn't that bad, he just played a prank on me and I got startled and fell off the web."

"I'm going to have some words with him later… Anyway, for now I have to get you back behind our lines. My name is Kumosento, and I'm your ticket out of here, understood? Now, you already know about the Eaters, right?" Kame nodded. "Great. They rule the Uebu Abyss below Nakama's web, but we manage to keep them from getting any higher. However, this means that the places that our webs meet Nakama's are vulnerable to their invasion, and every couple days they make an attempt to get at us."

 _I didn't realize summons had these sorts of problems,_ Kame thought. "Okay, so I assume we're not heading over to one of these places?"

"Yes." Kumosento tensed up, then spun about. Kame turned to follow his gaze and then really _did_ freeze up in fear. Back behind them, a massive leg reached up from the darkness and all the way around Nakama's web, followed by a gigantic Eater. Its mouth was large enough to eat Kame whole, and its legs had to reach sideways around the web and cling to the sides. _I would never have thought that this web would be TOO SMALL for a spider,_ Kame thought hysterically.

"Run." Kumosento lowered himself tensely. "Run, now. That one's too big for me to deal with alone." Kame did as ordered, noting that the spider beside him was moving slower than his top speed in order to not leave him behind. _They might be a pain in the ass sometimes, but… they take this contract seriously. I have to do them the same courtesy._

The Eater behind them chittered extraordinarily loudly, shaking the web with its movements. Its long legs ate up the distance between them, but even as it closed the gap, Kame saw something huge ahead of them- A massive chunk of rock, bigger than a large building, caught in a point where four of Nakama's lines met. Other webbing had clearly been attached over time until a semi-flat plane of webbing had been formed in a wide area around it. On the webbing stood another massive spider, a good eighty feet from left to right. It was clad in the same full-plate armor as Kumokotto had been during the trial. _That must be the boss summon…_

"Tsuyoi!" Kumosento shouted seemingly desperately, and the hulking combat spider turned around deceptively quickly for its size. _Huh, does the big one not have a Kumo- name?_ "Behind us!"

Kame and Kumosento crossed onto the flattened plane with the forty-foot wide Eater close on their tail. Kame half-turned to see that the Eater had almost caught up, then- "Web Bullet!" From ahead of him, a huge projectile of the sticky web substance flew forward and slammed into the Eater. It rapidly hardened and trapped the monster, then Tsuyoi approached and impaled it, instantly ending the struggling. _Wow…_

Tsuyoi swung out a leg, launching the large Eaters' corpse down into the void, before turning towards Kame and speaking a loud, commanding voice. "Are you the summoner?" Kame put an arm behind his head awkwardly. "How did you end up down here?"

"I… uh…"

Tsuyoi made a long, breathy chitter that Kame interpreted as a sigh and moved back towards the rock. _Damn it, I'm never gonna get anything to respect me. Why is this contract so hard?_ Kumosento nudged him forward. "Go ahead, summoner."

Kame was starting to feel even more self-conscious, realizing that he was only able to actually _summon_ one spider. "Uh… you can just call me Kame."

"Ah. Then you may call me Sento, if you prefer."

"Wait…" Kame suddenly realized why all of the spiders' names started with Kumo. "Is Kumo a title, or last name, or…?"

"Kumo is like… a full name. Used out of respect, or in official circumstances." _I'm such an idiot. I've been running around calling people by their full names- no wonder I can't get a single summoning bond._ "Now, come with me. We'll find my child and I'll make him apologize."

"Oh, that's not necessary-" Kame didn't hold anything against the little spider.

"It is." Kumosen- No, _Sento_ was marching forward and Kame tried to keep up. The small combat class member had an air of regret in his voice. "It's been a long time coming for the little scoundrel, and now is as good a time as ever." Kame sensed that if he kept quiet, Sento would just keep talking. "He's… well, he's too small for the combat kids and too rough for the trickster kids. I need to man the Depths more and more, but it feels like every time I see him he's a little bit more out of control."

Kame didn't respond, even as the pair made their way from the top of the rock onto a strand leading up to the weaver layer. Sento lapsed into silence, but then started speaking again: "His mother, she's wonderful, but… she's at the end of her web." _Is that the spider version of 'end of her rope'?_ "I'm not sure what to do… he pulls pranks all the time but wants to be taken seriously, he wants to get better at fighting but won't train with anyone…"

 _That sounds like… Naruto._ Kame actually laughed out loud as he compared the stories of the Seventh Hokage's childhood with the energetic, prideful, and mischievous little spider. Sento rotated slightly towards him, but then turned back to the path and dropped into a more lasting silence. They ascended through the layer of the weavers fairly quickly, as it was probably the easiest to move around in. True to their class's name, the brown spiders were expert web-crafters, and their layer was a masterpiece. Composed of mesmerizing geometrically organized patterns, it was actually highly unlucky that Kame had even fallen through it- the larger holes were few and far between.

The tricksters' level was more confusing, glistening webs that twisted and turned with no apparent patterns. In one of his earlier visits, Kame had actually gotten lost there and spent the greater part of a day trying to find his way out. The trickster spiders also had a habit of making their webs invisible or disguising themselves behind illusions, which meant that Kame would bumble into them. _Ugh,_ he thought, _I'm pretty sure that I've gathered a reputation as the most ridiculous summoner ever._

The combat layer was strange- almost like real-life tarantulas, the combat class built their webs as flat and thin, with huge amounts of smaller threads, all around and over rubble that they'd caught. Sento turned off the web and moved to the right, so Kame tagged along as the older spider walked him through the almost _streetlike_ thicker web-lines that ran between and around the individual webs. _This is a lot more like human society than I thought_ , Kame admitted.

All of a sudden, Sento tore off to the left. Kame was confused until he saw the orange spider produce a small amount of webbing, put it on his front leg, and then use it to snatch… something. After being caught, Hiro dropped his illusion with a shimmer and then crossed his two front legs in a strangely human gesture. "I won't apologize!"

"You listen here, _boy_ , you could have killed the summoner! The first summoner in decades!" Sento shook his son around in the air. "Can you imagine how bad that would be!?"

"No!" Hiro was still defiant. "You can't make me!"

"This is even worse than when you put webbing in disrespectful images all over Nakama's leg!" Sento yelled.

 _Okay, that's the last straw._ Kame strode forward, burying his light amusement at seeing his tormenter shaken around, and spoke. "Kumosento," he started, using the formal name, "would you allow me to form a summon bond with your son?"

Sento immediately stopped shaking Hiro around and turned to face Kame directly. "You would… but…" he became quiet for a few seconds. "If Hiro agrees to it. Yes, maybe this'll be good for the boy."

After being dropped, Hiro ran up to Kame. "Are you really sure you really want- I mean, of course you do! I'm the strongest spider of all time! Of course you want me to help you in the human world!"

Kame squatted down and put a hand over the little spider, patting its abdomen. This time, _he_ had to reach out and try to feel the chakra, but after using his cursemark he had a better grasp of it. It came easily, even more easily than Kafu's had, filling his mind with a sensation of life and vibrancy and energy. _That's a lot of powerful positivity,_ he thought. _Never would have guessed that the little spider had that inside him- or maybe all children do._

That philosophical line of thinking was cut off when he remembered that he'd been leaving before getting bogged down with this situation. _Oh shit- I'm really, really late._ He sprinted off, drawing confused comments from the two spiders he'd left behind, and went straight up the large webline that he knew led to the sage's plinth. Hopping from one foot to the other in anxiety, looking like a small child that had to pee, he waited a few seconds until the sage emerged from the Sage Layer. Kame had never been to that layer, not having yet earned that honor, and he couldn't see it- it was built around Nakama's body, a sacred place.

 _Orochimaru is gonna be pissed…_ "Hey, Tensai…" the spider made a disgruntled noise. "Oh, Kumotensai? Right, because you're a sage… anyway, I really need to get home, so-"

And with an all-too-familiar yanking sensation, Kame was taken out of the spiders' realm, now one summon-bond richer.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Orochimaru was a lot less upset about his tardiness than Kame had feared. The Sannin listened to only half of his explanation before cutting him off- "Stop. You've wasted enough time already, so stop making useless apologies and _listen_."

Hiretsuna cackled. "Ten _more_ suck-up points for you, kid." He and Haku were both standing beside Kame. Orochimaru turned his glare to the fat sadist, but shook his head and evidently decided that any more chastising wouldn't be worth it.

"I am giving the three of you a mission." Kame rocked back on his heels a little bit, mentally preparing himself for whatever heinous act he'd be asked to commit. "Another one of my bases near the Land of Rivers has been discovered. While the one that you two," he said pointedly to Haku and Kame, "found was a relatively simple outpost, this one is of much greater importance. Now that it's been revealed, I am sending the three of you to recover research and then destroy the base in its entirety. If any enemy ninja arrive before you finish, kill them."

 _The Land of Rivers…_ Kame worried briefly about running into Gunaji's team, but realized that it was unlikely a genin squad would be sent to attack one of the large bases. More likely it would be an ANBU crack squad, which… "Lord Orochimaru, are you…" _I don't want to upset him._ "Are you certain that…" _I can't piss him off._ Kame just dropped his gaze and quieted down.

However, Haku picked up where he'd left off. "Are you sure that we can take out the ninja they send to attack the place?"

Hiretsuna gurgled out a chuckle. His laughing sounded like (and often ended with) wet coughing. "Let 'em come. I need to get another fifty confirmed kills before the next bingo book update comes out to keep up my streak." _What kind of sick…_ Kame realized that he'd be going on a mission with the disgusting man. _Am I really prepared to-_ He shook his head. _Nope, too late._

Orochimaru sat down in his throne. "I am sure that Hiretsuna can deal with them. You two are not strong enough to take on jonin, but you should be able to support Hiretsuna enough to get the job done." Kame nodded. "Now, Grandmother left more information on the specifics of what you will be reclaiming with your mission supplies."

Grandmother materialized beside Orochimaru. She smiled at Haku and Kame: "Are you cuties ready for your first mission? Oooh, this is _so_ exciting! Now, I'm gonna be sending you all to the closest major base, which is a couple of days' walk away. I already packed bags for you and left them there. Good luck!" She ran through a set of handsigns. "Here you go!" _Wait, no-_ "Group Reverse Summoning Jutsu!"


	28. Arc 3 Vol 6: Slippery Slope

**(A/N) Cross-posting this to AO3. Was going to do Wattpad as well, until I saw what the entire site was occupied with. Sorry for lack of post yesterday, had three exams today so studying took up all of my time.**

 **Bingo Book Entry: Seikaku**

Threat Level: S  
Ninjutsu: 4  
Genjutsu: 4  
Taijutsu: 10

Village of Origin: Hidden Leaf  
Status: Attack On Sight  
Known Crimes: Treason, Murder (43)

Combat Style: Hyper-long-range bow specialist. Maximum range is thought to be around one mile (unconfirmed). May have some sort of visual aid (unconfirmed). Bears a cursemark, type unknown.

Notes: Attack on sight and chase no matter what, because any attempt at retreat will lead to being shot. Disappeared from Hidden leaf originally, Leaf offering massive bounty for immediate return. Never heard to speak, currently loyal member of Orochimaru's Sound Ninja Four.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

If Hiretsuna was unpleasant to share a massive base with, he was downright intolerable as a travel partner. After leaving the nearest base north of the Land of Rivers' borders with a reverse summoning seal, they were still a good ten hours' walk (and it really _was_ a walk, Hiretsuna refused to even jog) away from their goal, and every minute of the first day had been spent listening to his complaining. Kame hadn't even been able to practice any jutsu, too distracted by Hiretsuna's raving. He'd made one attempt at getting the older man to be quiet, which had been met with several sprays of acidic slime that he'd barely dodged. After that, Kame had given in and just listened. _It's not just his hair and skin,_ he thought sarcastically, _even his damn voice is somehow greasy._

"So yeah, Saiken's just flailin' around and slimin everything and everyone, Orochimaru's tryna seal it inside me but catches a tentacle to the face and goes flyin." Hiretsuna waved his arms to emphasize his story. "Sankuryu's doing okay til he gets put into a bubble and starts floatin up towards the ceiling, yellin at us to help him…" He had the slowly growing smile of someone building up to a punchline. "Seikaku does her awkward little blushin thing for way too long, then decides to shoot him outta the sky even though everyone's tellin her not to… and he falls fifty feet and breaks half his bones!"

Kame did his best to fake a smile to match Hiretsuna's gurgled chuckling. The man eyed him and stopped his laugh: "Eh, that one was weak, if yer gonna fake a smile then at least try harder than that. Five suck-up points. Now… where was I? Oh yeah! So, with that idiot down'n'out and Himei being totally useless, I'm startin to consider just walkin away, until… well, Seikaku was always such a prig, ya know? Never even gave me a chance, went straight for Sankuryu." _Yuck_ , Kame thought. _I never want to imagine Hiretsuna making advances on anyone, ever_. "But then Saiken vomits out this huuuge wave of weak-ass acid, and she doesn't dodge it. Before ya know it, most of her clothes are gone, and…" he whistled.

"If you think there was a chance in _hell_ that I was gonna just walk away after that, well…" Hiretsuna wiggled his eyebrows at Kame, seeming to draw some sort of satisfaction out of the awkward reaction he got. _This is even worse than-_ Kame remembered the girl's underwear joke and revised what he was going to say. _This is almost as bad as Miriki._ "Orochimaru finally gets his shit together fer long enough to throw up some kinda sealing, and I start layin into the big slug with everything I got, and eventually…" he trailed off, raising his hands into the air and then pointing at himself. "The stupid thing _finally_ gives up."

"That's… nice?" Kame tried to keep the unpredictable man appeased.

Haku piped up for the first time in hours. "What's Saiken like?"

"Huh?" Hiretsuna seemed genuinely confused. "Why would ya wanna know that?"

"Because mine doesn't really have a personality, so I wondered…" Hiretsuna narrowed his eyes in confusion. _What; is his pebble-sized brain incapable of comprehending a simple concept?_ Every day that passed without him voicing them, Kame's thoughts grew more and more sarcastic. Haku sighed looked downcast, continuing in a resigned voice. "Well, I guess Orochimaru didn't explain-"

"Nah, he totally did, I just didn't give a crap." Hiretsuna scratched the back of his neck.

Haku soldiered on despite the implication that he still didn't care. "Okay, then I guess the simple version is that I don't _have_ a tailed beast." That finally got his attention. "I have… I guess it's like a whirlpool? I don't know how to describe it, but it's a mindless… thing… that just wants to consume more chakra. People kept telling me that the tailed beasts were angry but reasonable, but I never… It never said anything to me that wasn't…" she trailed off.

Hiretsuna seemed to actually grow happier with the news, which was mildly confusing until Kame realized why. "Hell yeah! So you aren't a stronger version of me!" _Really? That's what he's worried about?_ "I knew Orochimaru wouldn't replace me!" His glee visibly gave way to a calmer smirk. "Eh, who am I kiddin, nobody could replace _me_. Especially not a little girl like you… Hako?" _Does he not even know her name?_

"Uh… my name is Ha _ku_." Haku seemed reluctant to contradict him.

"It's gonna be at least two more years before yer old enough for me to care what yer name is, Hako- wait, how old are you?"

"I'm fourteen." Haku seemed oblivious to Hiretsuna's hidden meaning.

"Oh… in that case, wanna see some of Saiken's powers up-"

"Nope!" Kame risked interrupting the man, who turned with annoyance to face him. _I really hope Haku wasn't paying attention during that Saiken story_. "Uh… Haku asked you a question before, so can you answer it?"

"Ugh. Saiken is… how do I say this?" Hiretsuna put on a thoughtful face and actually seemed to be taking the question seriously. "He used to be a pain in the ass, but I grew on him. Took a while, but he finally got a sense of humor."

"What do you mean by that?" Kame asked, dreading the answer.

"Well, he likes the things I like…" Hiretsuna grinned. "Melting things off of people- I like to do it to their clothes, but we both like to do it to their _skin._ " Kame shuddered. "I want to be stronger, and he wants me to show off his strength."

"But- does he ever try to take control?" Haku asked, seemingly unfazed by the horrifying things the man was saying.

"He used to, but… heh… I put him in his place." _What? How?_ "Me 'n him see eye-to-eye now." Kame wanted to ask more about how Hiretsuna somehow held the reins in his relationship with the sixtails, but before he could, the man was pointing ahead of them and smiling. "There we go, a town!"

Kame looked ahead to see a tiny village, buildings numbering in the tens. There were several farms within sight at the edges, but a large road led into and out of the cluster of wooden buildings. _Alright,_ Kame thought, _this is probably just a waypoint town. A stopping place for travelers and a small group of craftsmen and shops for the surrounding farms._ Hiretsuna, alarmingly, seemed to be heading straight for a larger building that seemed to be an inn or tavern of some sort.

Kame missed his chance to stop him and had no choice but to tag along, hoping beyond hope that Hiretsuna wouldn't hurt any innocent people. His superior walked past the villagers, drawing stares and a few gasps of recognition at the sight of the distinctive Hidden Sound headband that he made no efforts to disguise. Kame followed behind, eliciting further stares and wondering why the elder sound ninja was walking in plain view. _If we're seen, then missions will… wait, they'll scramble teams to come after us, but there are no nearby Hidden Villages, so it should take a while. If we can just avoid a fight,_ he thought, _we should be okay, right? A town this small won't have shinobi in it, so as long as the locals phone for help and don't attack Hiretsuna…_

When he pushed a curtain aside and stepped into the tavern, it wasn't as bad as he'd feared. Hiretsuna was sitting on a barstool, shouting at the bartender: "Oi! Get me the strongest sake you have."

The man behind the counter glanced around the room and so did Kame. The other patrons, all seemingly laborers or merchants, were down to a man unwilling to meet either of their eyes. Without any support, the barkeep had little choice but to nod and reach underneath the counter, pulling out a green bottle and moving to pour its contents into a cup. Before he could, though, Hiretsuna grabbed his arm with one hand and removed the bottle with the other, then drained the entire bottle in a few seconds. "Good. Now your food."

Kame was disgusted by his fellow missing-nin, but in the same line of reasoning that had carried him through the last few weeks, his will to make do with his situation overruled his morals. _I have to be careful,_ he thought. _If I keep going like this, eventually I'll give up every principle I have in the name of self-preservation. That said, I can't challenge him here and now._ "Hiretsuna, why are we here?"

"What d'you think, idiot?" Hiretsuna didn't even turn around, so Kame backed up until he was leaning back against the bar and facing the rest of the tavern. "I want some food and a warm bed."

"But-" Kame wasn't sure how to deal with this. "We can't just walk into-"

"Yeah I can!" Hiretsuna crowed as the barkeeper emerged from the kitchen holding a dish of steaming food. "See? I'm strong enough to do anything I want, especially around some country hicks like these people." He moved forward to dig in, messily stuffing his face.

In no time, the food was gone and Kame actually began to hope that the situation was over. Those hopes were dashed when a cheerful girl with brown hair and eyes, maybe seventeen or eighteen, came walking down the steps carrying an empty platter. "Dad!" she said to the horrified barkeep, "Is there anything else you need me to do, or…"

Hiretsuna's face split in a smile that Kame knew all too well. _Ah, shit._ He patted the seat beside him, speaking with intense hunger in his eyes despite all the food he'd just consumed. "Hey, you there." The girl turned to look at him with curiosity then revulsion. "Yeah, you. Why don't you come over here next to me?"

"Eww, no…" the girl trailed off, glancing around the room at the silent occupants and at her father who was quivering with fear. Then she looked at Hiretsuna's headband, at the weapons pouch on his belt, and at Kame and Haku.

"Run, Mitaka!" Her father was brave to yell, but the moment that the words left his mouth, Hiretsuna threw out a hand. A splatter of pale slime flew forward and covered the barkeep, who keeled over almost immediately. _No… I've seen Hiretsuna's acid eat through solid steel in seconds. Damn it! We weren't supposed to be doing this!_

The girl shrieked but Hiretsuna kept his smile. "Hey, hey, don't be so upset, beautiful. He ain't dead… yet." The threat, and demand, were both implied.

 _Can I really be party to this?_ Kame glanced over at Haku, who had her hands clenched at her sides. _I… I can't just let him do this, in front of her, if only because I don't want her to think I'm that kind of person._ He opened his mouth to protest, but a newcomer beat him to it.

An angry teenager came bursting through the door, panting from exhaustion. He obviously took in the situation and then whipped out a sword and began shouting. "Hey! You there, the missing-ninja! Hiretsuna and… uh…" he briefly lost focus, clearly not knowing who Kame or Haku were, but gathered himself quickly. "Hiretsuna! You and your two lackeys are to leave this town immediately!" Despite the strong threats, the boy was clearly only a few years older than Kame and Haku were. His clothes were shoddy and patched and he held his sword with the ready incompetence of a person who had spent many hours practicing the wrong techniques by themself.

The sixtails jinchuriki looked at him with a smirk that only grew larger. "Oh, are you the hero?" The boy's eyes flicked over to Mitaka. "Here to rescue your princess?"

"I'm here to run three criminals out of town!"

Mitaka called to him with a choked voice: "Just run, Toka! Get out of here while you still can! You can't fight these people, they're-"

Hiretsuna stood up from his stool, sending a collective flinch through the room and silencing the girl immediately. Killing intent rolled outwards from him as his voice dropped into an oily, confident tone: "This is gonna be all kinds o' fun. Now, here's the deal: Princess," he said to the boy in the doorway, "yer gonna go upstairs with me. No fighting, no whining. If you don't, then I'll put some acid on yer little hero that'll work nice and slowly, melting into him over hours until it reaches somewhere lethal."

"No! I won't do it!" Toka raised his sword and started to run forward. As Kame froze in horror, certain that he was about to watch an innocent person die, Haku blurred forward and slammed a fist into Toka's gut. He doubled over and dropped to the ground, lying there either unconscious or in too much discomfort to speak any more.

"Killjoy." Hiretsuna sounded cheated. "That's no fun. The best part is when the girl either watches him die, or watches him abandon her. Well, I guess the dying option is still-"

"Hiretsuna." Kame decided then and there that there were some things he wouldn't do, even for survival. _If I saved Haku only to sit with her and watch Hiretsuna rape innocent girls, then…_ "Let's stop."

"Huh?" Hiretsuna looked bemused, but he also wasn't attacking anyone for the moment.

"I said, let's stop." Kame resisted the urge to enter a stance of any sort. _As strong as I think I am,_ he reminded himself, _Hiretsuna will destroy me. He kills high-ranking shinobi for fun and has a real tailed beast sealed inside of him, one of the stronger ones. I can't let this turn into a fight of any sort._ "These stupid hayseeds aren't worth it. C'mon, can we-"

"Did you forget the ass-whooping that Orochimaru gave you? It was literally _yesterday_ that you were crumpled up on the floor." Hiretsuna's eyes blazed and the smile faded a little. "You better drop this goody-goody shit _right now_ , or you'll be the one melting alive and yer little friend'll be the one watching it."

Kame quavered a little bit when the jinchuriki's eyes flickered over to look at Haku, but steadied himself and kept talking. "Now that we played our hand, the villagers probably already sent word. There'll be more jonin coming, maybe even the Tanikage himself if he knows who we are." _This is a gamble on just how overconfident Hiretsuna is. If he thinks he can beat the Tanikage, then he might actually seek out the fight._

After a long silence, Hiretsuna slumped back over and went back into his casual smirk. "I see what yer sayin, if we go now then we can set a trap for 'em at the base. That's a good idea." Kame sagged over in relief, but froze at his next words: "But if you _ever_ contradict me again, especially in public, I'll burn yer skin off."

"Understood." Kame nodded and the burly man rose off of the stool and walked towards the doorway, past the crumpled Toka. Haku fell into line behind him and Kame followed as well, but before he could step out the curtained doorway, he heard Mitaka cautiously speak behind him.

"Tha… thank you." She sounded so unbelievably happy and relieved, but instead of triumph or heroism, all Kame could feel was a hollow feeling of guilt. He left the tavern without even turning around.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

"I've been tryin to do a scientific… study? Experiment? Inqui… Inquisition… Inquiry? It don't matter, what I'm gettin at here is that I've got a _lot_ of different acids, but I don't know which ones hurts the most." It was late at night now, hours after they'd left the small town, and Hiretsuna was back to his incessant talking. "So _obviously_ I'm not gonna test it on me, but hell if I can get people to explain their pain objectively while I melt their arm, ya know?"

 _No, I don't_. The night was growing colder and colder, and although Kame knew that they should be arriving at the base soon, that didn't make listening to his superior's inane (and often disgusting) stories any easier. "So thanks to all the selfish bastards out there, I'm playin it by ear most o' the time. I think the top couple of 'em gotta be the one that takes hours but melts _anything_ , a real beauty I came up with that melts their skin and _only_ their skin, or…" Hiretsuna looked briefly thoughtful. "Naw, it's definitely the first one.

"Even if uncooperative people just scream instead of givin me feedback, they scream the loudest when the acid goes up their arm for hours before getting to anything important." Kame shuddered helplessly, imagining all the innocent people Hiretsuna had done that very thing to. "Plus, there's nothin there for really _measuring_ pain, right? I mean, that idiot on the akatsuki… what was his line? You don't understand… the world?"

"The world will know pain," Haku supplied helpfully.

"Yeah, that one. But didn't he also say-"

"My pain is greater than yours?" Kame tossed out another one of the rinnegan-bearing shinobi's lines.

"Yeah, there we go. Damn, you two are like dictionaries, huh?" _I seriously doubt that this guy even knows what a dictionary is_. "But how'd he know, eh? Pain isn't somethin people can just add up and subtract. Someday, I'm gonna make a scale of pain from one Hiretsuna to ten Hiretsuna." He smiled and stared happily off into space. _Is this seriously his dream?_ "Orochimaru's all for it; even lets me use some of his clones once he's done with 'em."

Thankfully, the conversation was cut short when they reached their destination. The base didn't _appear_ to be there, but the carving on a large rock in the clearing told them all they needed to know. Hiretsuna led the way over to it, pressing a seal onto the carving, and another nearby chunk of stone shuddered as it slid aside to reveal a passageway. Hiretsuna spoke to Kame and Haku in a slightly more serious tone. "Alright, here we go. I'm putting you two in charge of gathering the… whatever. Imma keep watch."

Kame nodded and stepped forward into the dark tunnel, checking the map in his hands to see where they'd be heading first. This base was wildly unlike the two he'd seen before- while all of them were composed of underground tunnels, this one was painstakingly carved in strict right angles and perfect corners, following a distinctive and intuitive pattern. Kame descended past two floors seemingly serving as quarters for the base's occupants, ending up on the first of many levels dedicated to research.

 _The first thing we're supposed to get is… Deidara research? What the-_ Kame looked up and turned into the labeled room to see what looked like a hospital operating room, with medical equipment everywhere and spotless walls. In the center, there was a huge spread of files and several beakers or syringes of fluid. _The instructions say to get 'everything on table, as well as all clay samples.'_ Looking around the room, Kame saw the samples in question, all contained within glass jars. "Haku, do you-"

He turned around to see that she wasn't there, but after a brief moment of panic she poked her head around the door. "Yeah? What is it? I'm doing the rooms that you aren't…"

"Oh… okay then." Kame had just been about to ask her to do that very thing. _Grandmother gave me this… whatever it is._ He pulled out a scrap of paper and, as instructed, ran a little bit of his chakra through it. A large wooden crate immediately appeared on his hand where the paper had been, startling him so much that he fell over backwards and barely avoided having his foot crushed by the falling box. He began grabbing the files and equipment, shoving them into the box until the room looked bare.

 _On to the next,_ Kame thought. _Second on the list is… huh? Sasori research!?_ _Is this base dedicated to studying the dead akatsuki?_ He actually ran to the labeled room, unable to constrain his excitement at seeing the puppet-style master. Once inside, he saw… _Well, that's disappointing._ There were no puppets, only a few scrolls lying about and a strange cylinder with a seal on it and purple growths coming out of it. _Wait is this the seal that let him…_

Kame cleaned out the room into the box and ran some chakra through it, dismissing it back into a scrap of paper in his pocket. The next on his list was Kisame, but that room was already occupied by Haku, so he moved on to… Konan.

 _Wait, this means Orochimaru understands her paper style. Could he… teach me?_ Kame darted into the chamber and was met with the sight of huge amounts of paper and a few files on the table. After a brief, cursory check to make sure no one was watching him, Kame began digging through the files, finally coming upon one labeled as 'conclusions'. He opened and read it:

 **Findings:** ' _Paper Style' is not a combination of Wood release and Wind release as I had anticipated. It is actually simply an advanced transformation jutsu that turns a person's chakra and body into paper, which can then be manipulated. Further investigation revealed sparse records of this jutsu, called "Dance of the Shikigami." Seals and chakra movements are listed below._

 **Conclusion:** _Non-useful given my existing, superior transformation jutsu. In addition, requires huge amount of willpower to use without risking death._

' _Dance of the Shikigami?'_ Kame looked down the paper and saw that the handsigns and instructions for its casting were written out. _He said that using it was risky, right…? But-_ he glanced longingly at the power of the akatsuki member he'd most respected, sitting inches away from his face. _It can't be that bad, I'll just undo it if-_

"Kame!" Haku's voice from behind him shook him out of his silent reverie. _What was I thinking? I was talking myself into…_ he shook his head. "I finished everyone else. Are you done with Konan?"

"Uh…" Kame glanced back to the table, then summoned the empty box and put everything inside it. The conclusion, though, he stuffed into his own backpack. _Even if I'm not going to use it_ , he thought, _I want to have it. Maye at some point I'll bring it up to Orochimaru._ "I'm done, let's go."

Haku nodded and the two of them turned back towards the base's entrance, climbing the long staircase and out the short tunnel. It was fully nighttime now, the moon high in the sky above them the only source of light.

As soon as they exited, Hiretsuna grinned. "Finally. That took way too long, I was startin' to get bored." He rubbed his hands against each other quickly, then planted himself in a strong stance. "If you don't want to die, you should get back."

Kame nodded and retreated with Haku, flinching as Hiretsuna's chakra and killing intent swelled to fill the clearing. The man started to bubble, calmly then violently, and then a sickly light green energy boiled out from his skin and covered him. Slime began dripping from his body, pooling around his feet in an off-white puddle. "Mmmm…" Hiretsuna made a pleased noise as first one tail, then two, then three emerged from his back and two growths emerged from the chakra over his forehead. "It's been a while since I got to use this." _Use what?_ He raised his hands, then dropped to his knees and slammed his palms down on the ground, opening his mouth wide: "Acid Tsunami!"

A burst of the same sickly-green chakra poured from his mouth, spreading out ahead of him and crashing against the rocks. While the rocks began to break apart from the outpour, most of it was redirected into the base. As seconds passed, the gushing power seemed to only grow stronger and faster until the rocks were completely gone, and then the passage exploded back outwards with chakra as the base was completely filled. Hiretsuna stopped the vomit-like jutsu, straightening back up and cracking his knuckles. The sixtails' chakra retreated back into him seemingly without protest.

The chakra remained glowing and green, but moved more like a liquid now. As Kame watched in awe, the ground above where the base had been began to shift and collapse in places, losing more and more stability until it cracked apart into pieces. The chunks of dirt and stone dropped into a massive pool of acid at least fifty meters across. The lake of acid's surface level dropped at it ate away at the ground at its edges, but did it slower and slower until it eventually stopped. The glow faded, but what was left was a huge mass of white-green acid that didn't show any signs of going away.

 _That's… this is the power of a jinchuriki_. Kame's jaw dropped and he made no effort to recover, until he heard the movement behind them. _Shit-_ He turned around to see four forms come jumping down out of the trees. It was hard to be sure in the moonlight, but a few of them moved in ways that he recognized. One of them slid to a stop in a lazy, confident stance that Kame recognized all _too_ well.

 _No_ , he thought. _There's no way that they sent… what are the odds of… he's not even part of the Hidden Valley._ Despite his mental protests, the figure wearing a Valley vest over their long white cloak threw back their hood to reveal black hair, blue eyes, and the unwavering smirk that, for once, wavered.

"Kame? Haku?" Miriki Kosuki feigned the tone of someone meeting an old friend, but there was an unmistakable and uncharacteristic quiver in his voice that revealed the emotions buried underneath.

"Miriki…" Kame trailed off. Haku seemed unable to speak, and Kame joined her as the two other smaller forms threw off their hoods to reveal a shocked Keikiro's messy blonde hair and Gunaji's mask of rage. _Shit. He's going to try to kill Haku or die trying, and I don't want to… why is Miriki here with the Valley genin?_

Hiretsuna gurgled out his lazy chuckle. "D'you know these kids? Damn, that's a shame, it'll be awkward when I kill 'em."

"You'll do no such thing." Senshiko dropped her own hood, her grey hair and eyes began to faintly glow white as she drew her kama. "Hiretsuna, an S-rank missing-ninja with a history of rampant murder, rape, and torture. Kame Hakiara, a C-rank missing-ninja who committed high treason against several Kage. Haku Yorutsume, an A-class missing-ninja who committed treason, assault, and murdered one of my students. All three of you will return with me to the Hidden Valley in chains or in pieces." _She's… listing us off by our missing-ninja profiles. Why is…?_ Kame watched Keikiro and Gunaji grow a little more resolute. _Oh, it's a way to remind them that we're the enemy_.

Hiretsuna actually licked his lips, eyes widening. "Am I, now?"

Haku stepped forward with a valiant (but misplaced) attempt at making peace: "Guys, the reason-"

Then her spiral cursemark stretched out over her body and she whipped to the side, barely managing to avoid the small, sharp rock that tore through the air beside her head. Gunaji growled in annoyance and threw another two rocks into the air, but before he could command them into an attack, all hell broke loose.


	29. Arc 3 Vol 7: Fallout

**Bingo Book Entry: Orochimaru**

Threat Level: S  
Ninjutsu: S  
Genjutsu: A  
Taijutsu: B

Village of Origin: Hidden Leaf  
Status: Attack On Sight (A-rank jonin or higher)  
Known Crimes: Treason, Murders (573), Kidnappings (132)

Combat Style: Uses body-modification heavily. Can resurrect from curse-marks of subordinates. Massive variety of jutsu, consisting of every nature type. Summoning contract with snakes. High focus in research upon kekkeigenkai, has a large arsenal of them.

Notes: Worked with Hidden Leaf, expelled for inhumane experiments. Spent decades as missing-ninja abducting civilians and ninja, founded criminal organization. After Fourth Shinobi World War, pardoned by Leaf and legitimized Hidden Sound. Decades later, wiped out Hidden Sound and resumed illegal activity, currently official enemy of every great nation. Believed to have control over both tentails and sixtails jinchuriki.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Kame had assumed that Hiretsuna's massive display of power had used up the sixtails' strength for the moment. _I was very wrong_ , he thought as he dodged backwards with Haku just in time to avoid a wave of acid that streamed across the clearing. Hiretsuna had jumped straight to four tails and the ground around him steamed.

All the Valley ninja managed to dodge the attack by leaping up into trees, but that was a temporary solution. The trees began to melt at the bottoms, slowly sinking down into the inescapable acidic pool. Hiretsuna seemed unaffected by his own jutsu, walking forward and making a few handsigns: "Acid Bullet!" A glob of his acid flew across the clearing and melted the tree where Keikiro's head had been seconds earlier.

"Keikiro! Gunaji! Miriki! This man is too much for you to deal with. Capture the other two, now!" _She's talking about me and Haku._ The three genin nodded to their leader and then simultaneously turned to face the tree what Kame and Haku stood on.

Then three rocks flew towards Kame and he had to dodge backwards. The rocks came back around to attack him again, and again, forcing him to gradually retreat backwards, further and further away from Hiretsuna. Haku came beside him and struck one of the rocks out of the air, but it didn't break and immediately went back to its attacks. _What is this kekkeigenkai? Like he said, it's definitely not puppet jutsu, we're out of his line-of-sight but they're still accurate._

Kame threw two kunai with attached paperbombs at trees and then retreated back atop another branch, activating stage one of his cursemark. Gunaji hopped up into a tree twenty feet away and Kame made a discovery: The Kokuseki boy's chakra shared the same… _feeling_ as the stones in the air. While no threads connected them, the stones were infused with his chakra. _Not that I couldn't infer that before, but…_

"Gunaji, please!" Kame begged, dodging another stone whipping towards his head. "Can we just talk this out? Keikiro? Miriki?"

The Valley kunoichi looked to Gunaji, who showed no sign of having even heard Kame's plea, while Miriki was nowhere to be seen. Kame sensed the chakra of a _fourth_ stone creeping up behind him and ducked when it shot through where his head had been. He felt chakra gathering and shot his gaze back to up look in horror upon Keikiro finishing up a set of handsigns: "Lightning Style: Stun Shot!"

A harmless trickle of light electricity appeared instantly in a line through Kame's chest. _What? There's nothing happening, why is_ \- Haku leaped in front of him, crackling in her lightning stance, just as the line of weak electricity flashed brighter and let out a boom. She absorbed the lightning even as it became harmful, drawing it into herself and then landing beside Kame.

"Thanks," was all he was able to say before they were dodging another barrage of the stones. Kame leaped back to the next tree while rapidly folding paper, then launched two weakened bomb airplanes and two windbomb airplanes. As the projectiles sailed forward slowly, he made a mental note: _I need to find a way to make these things faster._ At the moment, though, he had to do his best with what he had.

Gunaji leaped upward and forward. The two weakened bombs, folded less aerodynamically, moved slower than the windbombs until they fell behind in the arc. Kame judged the angles as best as he could, then detonated the pair of windbombs. The weakened bombs were blown upwards and backwards, ending up missing Gunaji but still being close enough for Kame's detonation of them to cleanly catch the Valley boy.

When the smoke cleared, Gunaji had fallen to the ground. Kame peered at him, unable to tell if he was unconscious or not- as great as the sensing granted by stage one was, peoples' chakra didn't change when they were knocked out. The stones were still moving, but much more slowly. _Maybe he's just dazed,_ Kame thought.

Miriki was still nowhere to be seen, and Kame worried that his friend might have dropped into the acid. His thoughts immediately returned to the task at hand when he sensed Keikiro's chakra, turning to watch as she came out from behind a tree and perform what looked like healing ninjutsu. He crushed the instinct to attack both of them while they were down, instead dropping down from his perch and cautiously approaching them. "Keikiro, can we talk?"

"You hurt Gunaji!" Keikiro turned towards him, face twisting in anger. "Lighting Style: Stun Shot!" This time, Kame knew to dodge the warning line of lightning, so when it flashed into an actually dangerous attack he was well out of the way.

"I'm sorry, he was trying to kill me…" Kame raised his hands, stepping forward carefully. "I used a less powerful paperbomb because I didn't want to hurt him."

As he said those words, Gunaji lifted up onto his elbows and glared. Kame mentally took stock of the four projectiles, noting how they weren't moving towards him… yet. _I don't want to kill them, I need to find a way to end this all peacefully_. "I won't fight you two. I never hated you and I don't hate you now."

Gunaji narrowed his eyes. "I don't… I don't hate you, either. I'm not afraid to kill you because you make me sick, but I don't-"

"Why?" Kame spat it out angrily. "Why are you trying to kill me? You knew me, and a few weeks ago we were _friends_."

"You took Haku away!" _Is he so obsessed with Haku that he hates me for saving her?_ "She needs to die for what she did, and you sided with a mass murderer and kept her from getting what she deserved! Sagino died and the one who-"

Keikiro turned sharply to look at Gunaji with concern. "What? You said that they decided to imprison Haku, not kill her." He didn't meet her eyes, and even flinched at her accusatory tone.

Kame spared him from any further questioning by finally exploding his frustration: "She didn't do it!" At this point, he was starting to get as upset as Gunaji was. "She wasn't the one who killed your sister, it was the monster inside her. She had no control over it-"

"But you can't have it both ways!" Gunaji interrupted him. "Is she a murderer who let the monster out and killed Sagino? Or is she too dangerous to allow in the world because she can't control it!? Either way, she should never have been allowed to exist!"

"How can you say that!?" Kame wasn't just asking Gunaji that question; he was also venting his suppressed anger towards the Kage. "How can you say that another human being doesn't deserve to live!?" Gunaji opened his mouth to reply, but Kame just kept going. "She's not a danger to the world and she's not evil. She's carried a horrible burden for her entire life, and she made _one_ mistake, and now you want her to die? I might have betrayed my village, but I would do it again if it meant keeping her alive."

Gunaji spat at him, completely unshaken. "You're a hypocrite. That man back there has killed how many people?"

Kame looked away. _I can't argue there,_ he thought. _Hiretsuna is just… evil_. Gunaji sensed his weakness and kept going: "He's evil, and Orochimaru is evil, and when you pick them over the great villages filled with good people you're clearly taking the wrong side."

"I'm picking the side that lets me sleep at night! Haku is a good person who's been through much more than anyone should ever have to, and I will never, _ever_ let harm come to a good person who doesn't deserve it. Not for my village, not for peace, not for the 'greater good'."

"That's the choice that a shinobi has to make." Gunaji sneered at him. "You're an idealistic idiot. You can't ever be a shinobi if you can't make sacrifices-"

"I will make sacrifices." Kame stood up. "I'll make sacrifices, I'll risk my own life, but I won't end someone else's. If the ninja way is to kill your friend for the sake of _village politics_ , then I'll make my own ninja way."

He sensed Haku approaching and turned to face her. Miriki's chakra wasn't next to her, so she must have failed to find and catch him. Suddenly, Kame felt another gathering of energy behind himself and whipped back around just in time to see Gunaji make a final handsign: "Earth Style: Shattercannon!"

The ground around him exploded with shards of rock flying forward towards Kame. The chakra senses were next to useless now with so many projectiles overloading his ability to track them, and his eyes were inadequate as well. Although he twisted to avoid the worst of it, pieces of rock still cut into his legs and one punched into his upper arm. _Shit!_ The intense pain drove most strategic thoughts from his mind and he staggered back right into the path of Keikiro's stun shot.

Haku darted forward and absorbed the jutsu before swinging an arm towards Keikiro, clearly moving with less speed and power than normal. _She doesn't want to hurt them, either…_ However, that ended up being a mistake, as Keikiro managed to dodge underneath the strike with deceptive speed. Four rocks came flying out from back behind the fight and Haku didn't sense them coming until it was too late. Despite having near-instant reactions, she had no senses beyond her own, and, like Kame, dodged only barely and still took a solid hit to her back.

She cried out in pain even as Gunaji spun to face her and cast his jutsu again: "Earth Style: Shattercannon!" The barrage of earth chips came forward but got knocked aside by a wave of chakra as she shouted right back:

"Seven Heavens; First Activation: Breath of Restraint!" _Haku's getting more serious about this_. She leaped forward and slammed a fist into Gunaji's chest- but he didn't go flying. His skin and clothing took on a rocky shell and he growled in anger, swinging out his own fist. Haku dodged it easily, but while dropping underneath she was forced to jerk desperately backward from the projectile rocks coming straight at her. _She can't avoid hurting them while also surviving all of their attacks…_

Kame noticed Keikiro preparing her own jutsu and decided not to let her finish it, leaping straight over and throwing out a paperbomb kunai. She noticed the kunai but decided to play it safe and substituted up into the treeline rather than let it come near her. Kame pulled out a piece of paper but took a blow to his side from Gunaji- _How? Did he already take out Haku!?_

Haku was on the defensive, hampered by bloody injuries to her back and her leg and barely avoiding the stones. Somehow, even while micromanaging several projectiles that assaulted Haku, Gunaji was closing in for taijutsu against Kame. _He knows that I'm not- Shit!_ Kame barely dodged another rocky fist that slammed into the tree next to him, splintering the wood and knocking off a branch.

Kame rolled backwards and sped through the necessary signs, trying his best to envision the chakra of his stronger summon. "Summoning Jutsu!" Gunaji momentarily fell back, although Haku cried out from another hit. _Damn it, I can't let him keep tearing into her- he'll kill her._ The thought shook Kame to the core- _If I can't win this soon, Haku is probably going to die!_

"Kafu!" The spider, still in its human woman form, turned towards him.

"Yes?"

"I need you to distract Gunaji for me." Kame realized, too late, exactly what tactic she was likely to use, but by then he was leaping over another stun shot from Keikiro.

Kafu strode forward towards the enemy and shimmered briefly into the form of… a large man. _What? So she isn't taking the seduction route, huh?_ Kame couldn't watch anymore after that, too busy keeping track of where Keikiro was to micromanage things for Haku or Kafu. _Alright, I last saw her up in that tree, so the first step is to draw her out._ He threw a straight-flying paper airplane to the side of the trunk, but she must have noticed it coming and jumped to the side before the blast radius came to encompass her.

Keikiro landed on the ground and stood back up quickly, speeding through a series of handsigns. Before she could finish or anyone could react, Haku simply _appeared_ behind her with an arm cocked back, then slammed the blow down into her. _What the hell!?_ She was standing with the black skin, increased size, and various additions of cursemark stage two… _Orochimaru said that it let her move more quickly, but that's almost teleportation._ However, his stage-one enhanced sense noted the huge residual chakra left behind almost in a path behind her, and even his own normal eyes could see the strange, purple after-image trailing back towards where she'd been.

Keikiro dropped instantly and didn't get up, leaving Gunaji as their only opponent for the moment, Kame turned quickly to see that Kafu _had_ achieved her goal… but at the sight of Keikiro being taken down, whatever she'd been doing stopped working and Gunaji shouted in rage. "Earth Style: Consolidation!"

Kafu looked at the enraged boy and shrugged, puffing back into the form of a spider. "I'm sure you can handle it from here, babe, so…" Kame winced as she disappeared back to her home and left her target still channeling their jutsu.

Kame sensed the wave of chakra dropping into the ground below the Valley genin and the way that it was pulling up chunks of earth and stone, forming them into a large form in front of him. The chakra faded, but what remained was a boulder two meters across that Gunaji slammed a hand into. "Now Kokuseki Secret Art: Full Inhabitation!" _Shit, that sounds bad-_

Haku used her stage two for the second time, appearing behind him and throwing out another blow, but before it landed Gunaji's entire body turned into stone. She must have been pulling the punch to avoid killing him, because on impact the statue didn't shatter. For a few seconds, there was only silence-

Then Haku dodged backwards as the boulder and body of Gunaji both exploded into shards of rock. All of the stone fragments glowed with Gunaji's chakra as they flew through the air, and Kame saw why: they twisted unnaturally and then, in unison, zipped forward towards Haku. She attempted to use Stage Two for a third time, but it failed and she dropped onto one knee right as all of the projectiles streamed forward towards her. _Did she already run through all of her chakra!?_ All of the stones punched into her, and somehow the silence afterwards shook Kame even more than the cry of pain he'd been expecting.

The, the various stones all either fell to the ground or came back towards the boulder area, reforming back into a glowing patchwork human shape that turned into Gunaji. Haku fell over flat onto her face, unmoving, and Kame saw blood… too much blood. Like it did whenever confronted with real horror, his mind tried to retreat into an emotionless state, but this time the anger refused to be quelled. _Haku…_

Gunaji turned towards Kame with a look of silent reproach. "You abandoned your village to save a monster, but it was all for nothing. You-"

Kame wordlessly substituted to the branch that Gunaji had knocked off of the tree earlier, then instantly forced his chakra to his hand: "Gale Force Jutsu!" His opponent didn't even have time to turn around before being blasted forward. In mid-air, Kame sensed Gunaji's well-depleted chakra and also the faint but noticeable imprint of his own paperbomb trap from earlier. As the two signatures neared each other, he mercilessly made the detonation sign and the blast fully caught Gunaji.

 _Haku…_ Kame darted forward next to Haku, who was lying there. She was still alive, but there were bad cuts all over her body and the blood had soaked through most of her clothing. The panic began to set in, the desperate search for something, _anything_ that he could do, and then slowly drained away into helplessness. "I was supposed to protect you," he whispered.

"Yeah, you were." Kame flickered his eyes to meet those of Miriki, emerging as pristine as ever from behind one of the trees. "But, you messed up." Kame didn't even try to verbally defend himself. "Keikiro, can you…?" Keikiro lifted herself up from where Haku had taken her down and cast a worried glance towards Gunaji, but Miriki reassured her. "He'll be fine, I looked at him just a second ago."

She bit her lip anxiously but moved over beside Haku and took in the situation. "I shouldn't… I can't… Sagino."

The seemingly meaningless sentence was too much for Kame to try and decipher, but Miriki just shook his head. "No. Sagino died because she stood against a monster trying to save a fellow ninja. If you let a fellow ninja die because of her, you're tarnishing her legacy."

Keikiro looked at him for long seconds, then bent over and began channeling a green light out of her hands, working on Haku's wounds one at a time. Kame watched with mingling amazement, fear, and hope making rational thinking impossible for the moment. Bit by bit, Keikiro seemed to undo most of the damage, but grew more and more haggard with each fixed cut. Finally, she sagged back onto her heels and then stood up, throwing one last worried glance at Miriki before running off towards Gunaji.

Miriki leaned back against a tree and crossed his arms. When he finally spoke, it was in the hard tone of someone doing something they knew they had to but didn't agree with. "Why did you do it?"

"Gunaji lied. They were going to kill her if I-"

"No, that bit was obvious." Miriki shrugged. "In the eyes of leaders, people like Haku are weapons- and time and time again, people choose to destroy weapons rather than give them to an enemy. It was the only possible explanation for you leaving." He sighed, losing the accusatory tone and seeming more exhausted than anything. "Why go so far? At any given time, there's a good fifty-percent chance that your worst fear is Haku being hurt. What happened to make you care _so much_ about her?"

"I…" Kame trailed off. _I know that I laughed at her, although I never met her, with Tetsute and Rakuyo. After that, I guess… when I first saw her, I couldn't do it anymore…? No, that's not right. Before that day, I didn't care about her. Why is it that, when I heard her actual name, I changed completely?_ "I think that she helped me become a better person."

"Huh. And this 'better person' line of reasoning led you to run to Orochimaru? To join up with mass murderers?" Miriki didn't sound malicious, just curious.

"No. I wanted to help her, no matter what it took." _But before that, I didn't care about people who were weak… what's wrong with me?_ "I thought it was wrong the way that everyone treated her."

"Huh. But you never thought anything like that about me? Or anyone else that you looked down on or ignored?" Miriki's tone became accusatory once again.

"I'm…" _I never even apologized to him, did I?_ "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have bullied you or anyone else. I guess Haku helped me see that, even if-"

Mirki began to laugh, a mirthless chuckle that carried more sadness than anything else. "I guess he was right."

"Who?"

"Ginsenbo." Miriki looked up into the sky as if searching for the right words. "The day before the graduation exams, he told me that if I went to school… well, he heard me talking about Haku. I guess he assumed that I had feelings for her, so he threatened to make one of my bullies… well…" Kame heard the words, but they refused to register. _No. Stop, don't say any more,_ he thought, but Miriki either didn't know or didn't care enough to stop explaining.

"He used the Hatogan. He knew how to use… well, eventually you can use it to make a person change their view towards another person. He said that he'd make you fall in love with Haku, just to spit in my face. I went to the academy anyway, because I didn't care- if he was making false threats then I didn't care. If he _could_ do it, then, well… you would finally see that the people you and your friends stepped on didn't deserve it."

Kame reeled, unable to respond, so Miriki just kept talking. "Then I saw you go over and talk to her between the tests, and during the ninjutsu test I used an identification jutsu to see whether he'd actually done it, and… it did work. You two…" he trailed off. "I don't know what to think or feel, anymore. I think telling you was the right thing to do, but the genjutsu should be broken now that you know it's been used. If you abandon Haku now…"

"I…" Kame looked back over towards Haku. His purely rational mind was in command now: _I upturned my entire life, abandoned my friends, betrayed my personal heroes, and risked my life, all for this? A genjutsu? I laughed at her, thought she was weak and should have quit. I knew what Tetsute and Rakuyo were doing and I just let it go. This explains it all. I knew there was something wrong even that day; but buried the suspicions deep down. It wasn't real, and-_

 _No_. Some other part of him refused to accept it and wrestled for control. _I… I spent my entire childhood admiring the people who were lonely. Naruto, Gaara, Sasuke, they all struggled through other children abandoning them and I told myself that I would never do that. Deep down, I wouldn't hurt someone so much like them…_

 _But I might have turned a blind eye. I might have ignored her, dismissed her like people dismissed my heroes. I wanted to be strong like them, but I also didn't want to be weak like people around me. Are these feelings real?_ The voices had consolidated into a single question that ruled his mind: _What do I really think, anymore?_

But as the genjutsu was supposedly unraveling, he felt absolutely the same. Instead of his mind clearing and an answer revealing itself, all the same worries clouded his thoughts and all the same hopes banished them when he saw Haku lying there peacefully. With more confidence than he thought he had, he finally spoke: "I will _never_ abandon Haku."

Miriki looked up at him in surprise, but masked it quickly and finally responded in a calm tone of voice: "I guess I misjudged you as badly as you misjudged me. I should have told you right from the start, but… after years of my family never allowing me to help her, when I finally saw her get a friend, I told myself that it didn't matter… I let you two build an entire relationship on lies and now I understand if you-"

"I won't abandon her." Kame shook his head. "Whatever your cousin did back then to make me act differently, now I…" _What if I hadn't stepped in? Would I have graduated without her? Formed a team with two other people, moved on?_ Another glance at her lying in a pool of her own blood shocked him deeply enough to force him out of hypotheticals and into what was his reality: _I am where I am, and the way I feel now is what's important_. "That genjutsu might have pushed me on the first step… but now this path is the one I'm on, and it's the only one I could live with myself taking."

Miriki nodded and took a long, heavy breath before replying. "Okay. Just… keep Haku safe, and…" he looked away from Kame's eyes. "Keep yourself safe, too."

 _Wait, was that a…_ "I, uh… thanks."

Miriki turned to walk away, but Kame called out one last question that had been gnawing at him for a very long time: "Miriki, why do you never flirt with Haku?"

The Kosuki heir turned and sighed, facade of indifference still up. "I don't know, I guess I just don't think she's pretty-"

"No." Kame narrowed his eyes, a little bit of the usual banter between them returning. "In the time we spent together you've flirted or tried to flirt with anything moving and female. Haku is…" he trailed off, but realized that in searching his mind to find what his real values were, he'd uncovered some feelings that he couldn't lie to himself about anymore. "Haku is pretty, she's smart, and she's a better person than I could ever be. You go for everyone but her, and although I don't want you to, I don't see why you wouldn't."

Miriki turned away, hiding his face and speaking measuredly. "I'm not… Haku isn't…" he slumped a little bit and shook his head. "Haku's been through enough. I'm not good for people… I make people around me unhappy. On the off chance that my family doesn't interfere, I get bored. It's fun, but I move on and they either hate me for manipulating them or forgive me for it and that's somehow _even worse_ -" His voice broke and, with a final wave over his shoulder, he just leaped off towards his teammates. "I guess I'll see you around."

Kame was left alone with Haku to think over everything that had- _Wait,_ he thought, _Hiretsuna! Senshiko! Shit, they're still fighting!_ In another fit of timing that seemed _too_ perfect, the forest shook with a massive boom. Kame tried to pick up Haku by slipping an arm underneath her knee and another underneath her shoulders, standing up- _nope_ , he thought. Physical strength had never been his strong suit, but it was still a little humiliating to be unable to pick up his injured teammate.

 _Crap, crap, what do I do…_ Kame glanced back and forth from the direction of the fight back to Haku's limp body several times, then looked towards where the three Valley genin were. _I can't leave her here, because if Gunaji wakes up then I don't think Miriki and Keikiro can stop him. But… I also need to see who wins the fight. If Sagino wins, then we have to run or she'll hunt us down, and if Hiretsuna wins, then he'll try to kill all the Valley ninja. If we try to stop him, he'll kill us. How can I make sure everyone survives?_

Luckily, or perhaps unluckily, the decision was taken out of his hands when another huge, spreading pool of acid splashed across the forest floor. Kame desperately grabbed Haku and did his best to pull her away, but the acid lost momentum before reaching them. As the trees sank down into it, the two jonins' battle came into greater visibility.

Kame actually gasped at the sight of what a battle between two S-rank ninja looked like. Hiretsuna was a sight to behold, as either his cursemark, tailed beast, or a combination of the two had turned his body into dripping slime, with six oozing tails and two eye-stalks sprouting from his head. The area that had been acidified was massive, so large that Kame could barely see the other end, but Hiretsuna stood close to its center completely unharmed. Still in stage one, Kame sensed the chakra infusing every drop of the slime.

Meanwhile, Senshiko stood a moderate distance away from him in the middle of the acid sea, somehow equally unharmed. In fact, her hair and eyes were emitting a bright white glow that made her difficult to look at, matched by her kama's blade. Around her, the acid was steaming- it looked like there was a patch of clear ground. _Is she repelling it somehow? Or just burning it up?_

Senshiko dashed forward, slow compared to Haku but still seeming… unstoppable. The whitish acid before her steamed furiously and created a wake of vapor even as an aura of light seemed to form in front of her, redoubled by his stage one senses that could sense the shield of chakra. Hiretsuna gurgled and a huge mass of slime hurtled towards her, but she cut through it in a swipe of white light that carried forward into Hiretsuna and forced him backwards. She reached him and cut upwards with the curved blade, discharging another huge burst of light and drawing out a scream of pain from him.

Hiretsuna dissolved into the acid and the swell marking his location moved away from Senshiko, who sent out several more slashes. Each one cut into and vaporized the acid, revealing the ground underneath for the briefest moment before it filled back in. He rose back out of the lake, returning to a vaguely human-shaped form, before continuing to grow larger and larger as more and more acid was absorbed. _Is this the full-summon? Oh, no…_ Kame's breath hitched as the monstrous sixtails' true chakra exploded forward into being, boggling his mind- _I've never… how can this much power exist?_

However, Senshiko just looked up at the sky as the last of the acid seeped into the now-towering Saiken, a pale mountain of white, slimy flesh with six tails and a massive maw. The monster opened its mouth and gurgled, "Acid Scattering!" A huge cloud of pinkish mist sprayed out of the mouth, spreading rapidly across the clearing and visibly burning into the ground. Senshiko made no effort to dodge it and was swallowed up by the corrosive fog.

When the mist cleared, the ground had actually been _lowered_ slightly and… not burned, but seemingly melted into a flat plane of brown dirt without any semblance of rock, wood, or plants. However, Senshiko remained unharmed, surrounded by a barrier of white energy. The glowing sphere dissolved away as she lifted her weapon above her head and shouted, "Moonlight Champion!"

Kame had to turn away as silver radiance blazed to life in the sky and streaked down into her, searing spots into his eyes. Although his eyes were closed, his stage one senses told his disbelieving mind that someway, _somehow_ , Senshiko was conjuring up a raging, seemingly endless stream of chakra from the sky above her. He blinked his eyes open and, careful not to look directly at her, saw a pillar of light that came shining down from the moon straight down into her. Her chakra swelled incredibly quickly, increasing by the second until the ray of moonlight petered out.

Kame dared a glance towards her and saw that she was now floating a good distance off of the ground, eyes and hair glowing brighter than ever. The kama in her hands was now encased in a massive copy of itself, constructed from moonlight and chakra, stretching at least ten meters from one end to the other.

Saiken gurgled in rage as green chakra consolidated in its mouth: "How can you have so much power, human?"

Senshiko began stepping forward, each footfall landing onto a briefly existent platform of light. "The moon gives me strength greater than human limitations, and the full moon gives me even more beyond that." She dropped into a run, holding the kama ready slightly to the side and behind her. Saiken's ball of energy seemed to solidify into being, then it leaned forward and began to blast forward a destructive wave of power-

But before it could hit anything, Senshiko flashed forward and swung the massive chakra-kama in an wide slash, forming a visible arc of light in the air where it had gone through. She seemed to have swung and dashed directly _through_ the sixtails' huge form, and the glowing and kama both vanished away over a few seconds. Even as she dropped to the earth, the mountain of slime also dissolved away, sinking inwards and shrinking away. In the end, both Senshiko and Hiretsuna lay flat on their backs in the flattened crater of their battleground, the massive gash in the earth where Senshiko's strike had hit marking a line between them.

Kame looked towards the collapsed Hiretsuna, who was struggling onto his feet. Haku stirred a little bit and groaned, and Senshiko also stood despite steaming skin. Kame glanced at Haku, nodding towards the field: "We have to get out of here." She nodded semi-lucidly and rose on shaky legs.

On the field, Hiretsuna was cackling madly. "Yer the toughest fight I've ever had… but you cut through my body. Big mistake. Now yer covered with a sexy lil' mixture I got inside me that'll take a nice, long, painful time to kill you."

Kame shouted, "Hiretsuna! We need to leave!"

He turned and eyed Kame with insanity in his eyes. "Didja already take care of the other ones?"

"Yeah." Kame lied, hoping beyond hope that the other genin knew to keep their heads down. "They're done for."

Hiretsuna let out a low, contented noise and began backing away from the weakly standing, slightly steaming Senshiko. "Let that run through yer head while you die. I'd watch, but…" he turned around and started walking off, leaving Kame and Haku no choice but to follow. Kame felt an unshakeable urge to throw one final look back at the Valley jonin, hoping beyond hope that she'd find a way to live, but only managed to see her collapse to the ground lifelessly before losing view altogether. _Forgive me,_ he thought. _Keikiro, Gunaji, Deihaka, Miriki… I'm so, so sorry._


	30. Arc 3 Vol 8: Newest Assignment

**Bingo Book Entry: Kame Hakiara**

Threat Level: C  
Ninjutsu: 5/10  
Genjutsu: 3/10  
Taijutsu: 3/10

Village of Origin: Hidden Sand  
Status: Attack On Sight  
Known Crimes: Treason

Combat Style: Mid-range tactics and explosives specialist. Possible cursemark (unconfirmed). Was genin-rank before defection.

Notes: Betrayed Hidden Sand for reasons unknown, works under Orochimaru. Tentails jinchuriki is known accomplice, careful of possible ambush if seen alone. Kazekage has asked for live capture, but no reason was provided.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

"So you mean to tell me that Hiretsuna was defeated?" Orochimaru didn't move a muscle, but he didn't need to- the disbelief and, by extension, tension in his voice made all too clear the danger that Kame was in.

"No, Lord Orochimaru, I…" _Damn it_ , Kame thought. _How do I hide that I avoided killing several enemy ninja? If I lie, he'll know._ "I, uh, fought to a standstill with the enemy genin while he dealt with their jonin. He went into a full tailed-beast state, and-"

"He allowed Saiken to fully take over and somehow _still_ lost?"

"He was fighting… Senshiko, do you know her?" Kame looked curiously at Orochimaru, who didn't react at all. "Right, sorry, anyway, she used some sort of moonlight absorption jutsu to empower an attack that destroyed the sixtails in one hit. Hiretsuna's body acid got onto her, and he…" _How do I phrase this?_ "Ordered a retreat, as the acid was sure to do the job for him. With the genin… incapacitated, we left for the base, and now we're here."

Orochimaru leaned back and remained silent for a long time before finally nodding. "You completed your primary objective, and I am placing Hiretsuna at fault for underestimating the enemy. When he recovers, I will deal with him. However, we don't have time to wait for him, which means that our next objective will have to be completed missing one of the Sound Ninja Four."

"And what-" Kame swallowed and looked down at his feet, continuing in a more restrained tone. "What _is_ our next objective, Lord Orochimaru."

"I have need of another tailed beast, and the Hidden Cloud currently contains the most vulnerable jinchuriki. In addition, the village is far more accessible during this year's make-up chunin exams, so we'll be attacking during those." _What? But that means-_ "We capture the eighttails' holder and escape. The chunin exam finals are in a few days' time, and during that time you need to surpass the level you're currently at- especially if you fought to a standstill with a team of _genin_." Orochimaru's eyes glinted dangerously.

Kame nodded again and turned to leave, but before he could take a step, Orochimaru spoke once more. "Kame." He reluctantly turned to face the Sannin, who had a look of mild bemusement on his face. "When I ordered you to recover _all_ of my research information, I meant _all_ of it." _Shit, we got back less than an hour ago, how could he know-_ "Give me the research conclusion on Konan's jutsu."

"I'm sorry, Lord Orochimaru." Kame dropped to his knees and fumbled around in his pack until he produced the folder and held it up to Orochimaru with shaking hands.

"You are terrified of me, yes?" The elder ninja still sounded more amused than anything else. "So tell me, why would you risk my wrath over information on a long-dead akatsuki member?"

"Because she was-" Kame dropped his head again. "Out of all the akatsuki, I've always wanted to know more about her. I've had an interest in paperbombs for a super long time and she's always struck me as someone people swept under the rug, plus no one knows how she died, and information on what she could do was never really released, but every known fight she's been in hasn't demonstrated any real limit-"

"Enough." Orochimaru waved a hand dismissively and Kame shut his mouth immediately. "I take it you read the conclusion, then?" Kame nodded mutely. "Then you know her jutsu?" Another nod. "But since you are still standing here, you made no attempt to use it. Good. You aren't foolish enough to go that far, at the very least."

Kame gathered up enough courage to speak. "I'm… I'm sorry that I-" He bit his tongue as he caught a glimpse of the Sannin's face, which was displaying actual rage.

"If you _ever_ make any attempt to disobey my orders again, I will not hesitate to kill you. Pawns that do not do as they are told are of no use, and pawns that actively work against me…" Orochimaru trailed off, letting the implied threat hang in the air. "Now listen to me very carefully: the Dance of the Shikigami is a jutsu used _only_ by Konan for good reason. It splits a person's chakra and body into sheets of paper that they can then manipulate- however, their consciousness is split among all of those papers as well. The sheer amount of willpower necessary to retain control over all of those fragments, not to mention move them around and attack with them, is not an undertaking for easily distractible genin."

Kame nodded and opened his mouth to respond, but Orochimaru extended a hand forward to grab him by the head and pull his gaze up until he met the man's eyes. "Heed my words: if you ever lose consciousness or focus while in the split-apart state, every little piece of paper will simply drop to the ground and you will cease to exist."

 _I see why nobody ever used that jutsu, then…_ Kame thought, but simply said: "Understood, Lord Orochimaru. It won't happen again."

Orochimaru let out a long, disappointed sigh. "Of course, you may find yourself wanting to use it as time goes on and you become more confident in your own skills. Konan used it to create six hundred billion paperbombs in her final fight, so-"

 _Six hundred billion!?_ Kame's eyes widened as his mind went through what such a weapon would look like. _That could destroy an entire village in- no, that could destroy more than a village…_ He caught a glimpse of Orochimaru's smirk and realized that the man was toying with him. Kame bowed and tried to push thoughts of _six hundred billion_ paperbombs from his mind. "I will resist the urge, Lord Orochimaru."

"Time will tell. Now, you're dismissed. We leave for the Hidden Cloud in a few days."

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Half an hour out from the Hidden Sound's land of lightning base, Kame found himself glad that Hiretsuna had been incapacitated _._ Seikaku and Sankuryu were out ahead of the group and Himei, Haku and Orochimaru were silent, leaving Kame to think in peace. Currently, he was doing the mental math involved with Orochimaru's claim of Konan creating six hundred billion paperbombs.

She'd stopped operating at about the time that the Fourth Shinobi World War had started, which was presumably when she'd died. Before that, the last time she'd been seen was during Pain's attack on the Hidden Leaf. _Assuming that only a 30-day month passed between those times, then she'd have to make 20 billion paperbombs per day, which is close to one billion per hour… If I could harness that, then I could-_

 _Damn it._ Kame grit his teeth and forcibly pushed his thoughts out of the Dance of the Shikigami. _If I die because I can't resist the temptation of using that damn jutsu, I'll-_

"Hey, Kame, right?" Kame's eyes snapped over to Himei, who'd dropped back until he was between Kame and Haku. The exhausted-looking man looked at him expectantly, but continued talking when no response was forthcoming. "Yeah, it's Kame. Anyway, what was I- oh, yeah. It's good to see that you two weren't… uh… corrupted by Hiretsuna."

 _What is he talking about?_ "...Thanks?" Kame glanced around him to share a confused look with Haku.

"That was a bad way of putting it, I guess…" Himei appeared to think for a few seconds, then shrugged. "I mean that I'm glad you aren't a Hiretsuna-type, you know? Just plain evil."

"How do you know we aren't?" Haku asked, eyebrow raised.

"I was in charge of watching Hiretsuna in the infirmary, and when he woke up- well, he's…" Himei seemed oddly confused about even his own words. "He's the kind that kills for fun more than anything else. You two aren't, and I think that… I got the impression that y'all even tried to stop him."

"Which one are you?" Kame felt a surge of curiosity towards the disgruntled yet good-natured Sound shinobi. "Do you enjoy being evil, or just do it because you _have_ to."

"Is it evil to be selfish?" Himei said the words in a more focused voice, one that belied an underlying attachment to the question.

"It depends on what kind of selfishness you're talking about." Kame responded carefully.

"I'm… you could say that I'm not a willing servant for Lord Orochimaru, although…" Himei sighed. "I had a family, a wife and daughter, who came down with a terrible disease. The doctors said it was genetic and couldn't be cured, something that was just in their blood. When I was facing a life without them, I… Lord Orochimaru gave me a choice. Betray the Mist, join him, and save my family, or watch my wife and child die in agony."

 _That's… I did the same thing for Haku._ "How is it selfish to care for others?"

"But I've killed for Lord Orochimaru. I kidnapped children for him, I killed wives and husbands, destroyed families. It's selfish for me to value my own family more than all these other ones, isn't it? Is that evil? Or just being a caring member of a family?"

Kame swallowed. "I… I guess I don't have an answer."

Himei shrugged nonchalantly. "There isn't one."

"Why-" Haku interjected, then backed up a little bit and started again. "Himei, why would you tell us all this?"

"I… don't know?" Himei gazed off into the middle distance. "I guess I want to think that I still got a little good left? When everyone in my life is like Hiretsuna, pure evil, or Sankuryu, without a moral compass at all, I think I wanted to get the thoughts of you two."

"But I did the same thing you did." Kame flickered his eyes over to Haku but decided to keep going anyway. "I left my village to keep Haku alive. I'll probably end up doing things like you have, but I don't have any-" _No, that's a lie._ "No matter how many regrets I have, I'm always going to be sure that it was the right choice."

"How can you be so sure?" Himei asked with a wistful tone, like it was something he wanted but couldn't achieve.

"Because I get to see someone I care about alive and well every day." Kame finally broke eye contact and dropped his gaze, wishing for escape from the conversation sooner rather than later.

"That's… a better answer than I've gotten before, I guess. Speaking of which, what are you two-"

Before the conversation could go any further in that direction, Kame decided to steer it away. "Anyway, Himei, why are you listed as an S-class missing-ninja? I saw Hiretsuna and agree that he's strong enough, but you, Seikaku, and Sankuryu don't seem…" _That's pretty rude,_ Kame thought. "Uh, you haven't shown your true power yet, so I don't know why you all have the same rank as the akatsuki."

Himei's mouth quirked upwards into a smile. "Oh, are you questioning my strength?"

"No! No, I'm just-"

"Relax," Himei said with the tone of an exasperated parent. "I was kidding. I guess Hiretsuna's a no-brainer, what with the sixtails and all of his powers, but I can see why me and the other two would throw you for a loop. I come from a clan with a strong sound-based genjutsu, and Orochimaru gave me a cursemark that makes me louder, so I'm pretty good at incapacitating people. I don't know if I'm S-class, but I guess the villages think I'm dangerous enough.

"Sankuryu… I've never seen him going all-out, but to be honest I don't really want to. He's Orochimaru's right hand, the most loyal person I've ever seen, and… well, you two have seen him sparring in taijutsu. Unblockable attacks, with _his_ speed? He's deadly." Kame remembered watching Haku fight with him- each blocked attack that would have been lethal in a real fight had driven in just how deadly he was. In fact, Haku would never even be able to fight him- her own attacks would simply break against his body.

"That leaves Seikaku, who… I mean, if anything, she's even more terrifying. All I know about her is that she had a visual kekkeigenkai and uses a bow. That's it. Lord Orochimaru hardly ever sends her on team assignments, but I think that without Hiretsuna we need her."

Kame couldn't refrain from speaking his mind at that. "Yeah, about that- the chunin exams are a time when a ton of ninja from all the nations are coming together to one place. Why the hell would we choose _then_ to attack? It seems like a bad decision-"

Then Orochimaru was standing beside him. "You just questioned my judgement."

 _Oh, shit._ Kame coughed in surprise and then desperately tried to save face- "I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I didn't mean to question you, it's just that-" _No, I can't defend myself_. "It's completely inexcusable and I can't defend it."

Orochimaru remained silent, but Kame's cursemark began burning, slightly at first but growing in intensity by the second. Just before his stifled cry of pain slipped out, the aching stopped and the Sannin sighed in discontent. "Your habits of insubordination are surprisingly resilient, but more punishment seems pointless. If pain couldn't get the message across, then perhaps…"

He turned towards Haku and before Kame could realize what was about to happen, she cried out and slapped her hand to the her back, keeling over slightly but remaining on her feet. Kame suppressed a suicidal urge to attack Orochimaru and scrabbled for words: "Wait, no, Lord Orochimaru, I'm sorry I get the message I won't question you anymore please just stop-"

Haku let out a sigh of relief and dropped her hand. Orochimaru turned to Kame and slowly smiled, continuing in a pleasant, conversational tone. "Oh, it looks like we've finally found a punishment that may work. From now on, Haku will be the one suffering for your disobedience.

"Now, you complained about my choice of time to attack?" Kame didn't nod or respond in any way, feeling too guilty about what had just happened. _Now she's going to get punished for my mistakes- should I have pretended that hurting her didn't hurt me? But then she would have been in more pain…_ "The chunin exams are a point in time where the borders are loosened, there is less suspicion, and the genin are in a set place at a set time. The problem with securing their jinchuriki was never in escaping once we had them; it was in finding and getting to them. Both of those actions are significantly easier to perform during the chunin exams."

Kame remembered another question he had and started to ask it, but then flinched and looked down, afraid of possible punishment. Orochimaru somehow seemed to intuit what he wanted to say, responding to his unasked question: "We won't be killing all of the genin, that would enrage the large villages far too much. When we secure the eighttails jinchuriki, the only village that has reason to be upset is the Hidden Cloud, but if we kill genin from all of the villages they may unite against us. The plan will be for Himei to trap the assembled shinobi in a temporary paralysis genjutsu, then for me to engage elsewhere in the village and draw out the strongest Kage and jonin. The rest of you will secure the target and escape, followed by Himei and I once sufficient distance has been achieved."

Kame nodded faintly, mind racing about the plan- _No, I can't overthink this. Even if I notice a flaw, if I point it out then Haku will suffer._ He set his jaw and continued forward in silence, trying his hardest to control his thoughts.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

As they arrived under the midday sun, all Kame could think was that the edges of the Hidden Cloud village were imposing, huge watchtowers set into the mountains. Kame wasn't sure how exactly they planned to infiltrate the Cloud without being seen, but at the moment he held his tongue, memories of Haku's pain still fresh in his mind. His patience turned out to be rewarded as Seikaku summoned a massive bow, far too large to use with just hands, at least eight feet from tip to tip. It actually appeared to be made of metal and had a strange apparatus right around where the handle would be-

Again Kame didn't ask what it was for, and again his curiosity was sated regardless when Seikaku slammed the metal thing into the dirt. Suddenly, it all became clear to Kame- the bow was now sideways, supported a few feet above the ground, and Seikaku stood behind it with the massive string clutched in her hands. She dropped the blindfold and Kame stifled a gasp- she had the veined, pale eyes of the Hyuga clan. The cursemark's black pattern became more reddish-orange and grew quickly, then she entered second state- two large, grey-feathered wings sprouted from her back and her eyes grew much larger and began slightly glowing.

She reached back behind her, plucking a feather from one of her wings and notching it into a bow. As she drew back the string, most of the feathering came away, leaving a bit at the end similar to a normal arrow, but mostly revealing a long, sharp, and surprisingly straight length of bone. Seikaku dragged the string back further and further, seeming to focus in on one of the watchtowers, then loosed the arrow. Rather than the thrum of a bowstring that Kame had been expecting, the arrow was launched silently and flew straight and true, far faster than he could hope to track. It was practically a streak of grey in the air, completely undetectable for Kame's human eyes.

Seikaku immediately repeated the motions, firing off eight consecutive arrows, all at different locations around the outposts. Kame, who couldn't even see any of her targets, could only sit and admire her unbelievable skill and efficiency. She finally straightened up and nodded, speaking in an all-business tone: "Eight killed. None left alive at the outer border."

Orochimaru nodded. "Now, we infiltrate." He strode forward and placed a hand over Kame and Haku's faces, and after a strange feeling of contact over every inch of his skin Kame felt normal. "You two now have your appearances masked." When he did the same to Sankuryu and Himei, Kame could see the film of white, skin-like substance forming over their faces and then gaining color until they appeared completely different, even their hair changing color along with it. Orochimaru did the same to himself, then pointed forward towards the village. "We're a group of Hidden Whirlpool shinobi who just came to watch the new talent compete, nothing more. Seikaku, remain here and support the extraction team when they make their exit."

Seikaku nodded and then Orochimaru, Sankuryu, Himei, Haku and Kame all walked forward towards the village itself, barely visible from their distance. As they first stepped onto the platforms, Kame's eyes widened at just how effective Seikaku had been- her shots had all punched directly through the heads of whoever she was targeting. _This is why she's an S-rank missing-ninja,_ Kame realized, looking back towards where she was hidden. _That's gotta be almost half a kilometer, and she's still deadly accurate_.

With the lack of border guards, their group continued forward unmolested and even made it into the more developed areas of the Hidden Cloud, passing by some other shinobi and civilians but drawing nothing but the occasional odd look. _They're too confident in their border guards_ , Kame thought. _They're all assuming that if we were a threat, we'd never have made it this deep into the village_. Orochimaru spoke suddenly from behind them, causing Kame to flinch a little bit in surprise. "Do not engage until you hear my attack beginning. Himei and Sankuryu, you know what to do. Haku and Kame, your roles will be to simply protect Sankuryu and engage on anyone who would try to stop him." At the group's collective nods, he moved off towards what looked like a downtown area.

Up ahead of the remaining group was a huge stone arena very similar to the one that their last chunin exam finals had been held in. Even as they approached the entrance to the stands, no one made any attempt to stop them, and the two guards for the stands were nowhere to be found. As they emerged into the seating area, Kame noticed two chunin clearly watching the match rather than minding their posts and rolled his eyes at the obvious neglect of duty. Suddenly, an impulse entered his mind- _I'm surrounded by good shinobi! If I just tell one of those guards, or anyone, then we can turn the tables and capture all the Sound ninja! In fact-_

Then he remembered what would happen. _If I do that, then Haku…_ he glanced over towards her, crushing the instinct to betray the missing-ninja, but then turned back again at the feeling of a hand on his shoulder. It was the man he knew was Himei underneath the disguise, who nodded to him: "It's time."

Kame reached into his pockets and pulled out the earplugs, Sankuryu and Haku doing the same, and put them into his ears. As soon as the motion was finished, he saw Himei running out towards the edge of the stands and shedding his disguise, even growing large wings and ears, and then jumping the railing and flying up into the air and opening his mouth wide. While Kame couldn't hear anything, the way that everyone in the arena fallen told him enough about what had happened and he followed Sankuryu, leaping down into the arena.

Kame winced at the sight of the same people that had made up the previous chunin exams crumpled in various heaps, apparently having fallen unconscious upon hearing the genjutsu. Sankuryu ran up the wall into the viewing area, slammed a seal onto Dako's forehead, and then emerged with the large boy slung over his shoulder. Kame risked another glance back towards the assembled genin before turning to follow his superior, who was running straight for the ground exit. _So far, there's been no resistance,_ thought Kame. _Maybe if we're lucky-_

Then, in a twist of fate that couldn't be coincidence, he felt a shuriken whistle by his head. He jerked to the side and turned quickly, catching only scattered glimpses of people he thought had been incapacitated: Miriki's brother, Ginsenbo, shaking Kosu was alarming, but not as much so as the sight of Naruko seemingly freed from the genjutsu and readying another shuriken to throw. _Why were they able to get out? Does that mean everyone can?_

Then again, he didn't have time to ponder that. At the moment, only Ginsenbo and the genin he was freeing one by one seemed to have their faculties about them, and none of them had any really long-range attacks, so Kame turned around and fled behind Sankuryu and Haku, unwilling to start a fight in such a dangerous situation.

He winced as he realized that he'd left Himei exposed, but realized that the man probably wasn't in too much trouble. In fact, as they continued through the city and saw shinobi and civilians alike collapsed in various positions, he realized just how powerful the man was- _an unavoidable auditory knockout genjutsu with this much range? No wonder he's an S-class missing-ninja, this is just ridiculous…_ As they approached the city limits, though, a young chunin stumbled towards them sluggishly and Haku had to dart forward and knock the man out by hand. _So we're leaving the village? Does that mean that we-_

Another shuriken whipped by Kame, drawing blood from his ear and forcing him to turn and see his fellow genin from the Leaf, Valley, and Cloud catching up to them.


	31. Arc 3 Vol 9: Fight or Flight

**(A/N) So the wiki is unclear on _how_ exactly the substitution jutsu works, but for the purposes of this story it's a justu in which a person targets a (non-living thing within a certain distance and size range of them) and swaps locations with it.**

 **Ninja Profile: Gakutsuchi Kamizuru**

Ninjutsu: S  
Genjutsu: A  
Taijutsu: B  
Specialties: Lava Release, Dust Release, Destructive Power

Description: Gakutsuchi is the child of Kurotsuchi, the fourth Tsuchikage, and inherited her black hair. She wears a grey dress and grey vest on top of it, which causes her pink eyes to stand out all the more. She is highly deferent to those she considers her superiors, although as time passes that list of people grows shorter and shorter. Her attitude towards those she considers inferior is dismissive, though not outright hostile.

Origin: After being born to the fourth Tsuchikage and raised in the Hidden Stone Village, Gakutsuchi was taught the Dust Style along with her childhood friend Sankuryu. Their lessons in the trump card technique of the Hidden Stone were a secret, and they grew to be close friends. However, after they'd both mastered it and moved on to greater things, Sankuryu and her fell apart from each other, and eventually he fell in love with a visiting Hidden Mist ninja. When he announced his decision to leave the Hidden Stone with his lover, Gakutsuchi told him that she couldn't allow him to leave with the Kekkei Tota in his possession. He disregarded her orders, and she chose to seal off his chakra network entirely, removing his ability to use the Dust Style forever and exiling him from the village.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

At the sight of the shuriken, both Haku and Sankuryu dropped their earplugs but didn't stop moving, so Kame followed their example. Although they were near the city limits, there were no visible ninja between them and the outer outposts. _The scream can't quite reach the entire Hidden Cloud, then._ Although he was still moving forward, quick backwards glances gave him a decent grasp of their situation: One larger, unidentified ninja, Naruko's team, Gunaji, Miriki, and Dako's two teammates were in hot pursuit. At the sight of Zandeina and Kosu looking so desperate, Kame felt a strong pang of guilt- _I'm taking away their teammate. I would be as desperate as they are if people were taking Haku away… can I really-_

Orochimaru's cold rage, and Kame's fear of it, snapped him back on course. _I can't afford to doubt myself, no matter what._ He dropped two paperbombs at his feet, forcing the pursuers to slow down and go around them. The second time he tried that trick, Gunaji's rocks swung forward and cut the paperbomb into pieces before it could even touch the ground. _Okay,_ Kame thought, _we're probably twenty meters ahead of them, and those bombs were five meters behind me. I think his maximum range should be about fifteen meters, then?_

Sankuryu growled and sped up, tossing a few instructions back: "Stop them."

Kame flicked another glance backwards and set his lips. _I can't just refuse, but…_ "I'm not strong enough to take on eight of them." Before Sankuryu could make another unproductive suggestion, Kame added onto his statement. "And I don't think me and Haku could do it together, either…"

Sankuryu was facing forward, so his expression was unreadable, but Kame was fairly sure that his superior was frustrated beyond belief. After a long sigh and an actual growl of annoyance, Sankuryu turned to Haku and spoke sharply. "My assignment from Lord Orochimaru was to ensure that the eighttails jinchuriki is secured. Haku, I am giving you the target so I can execute these pursuers. _Do not_ cause me to fail my objective."

Haku nodded, moving closer to him, and then Sankuryu handed over Dako to her. She carried the larger boy with little effort, darting off to what would hopefully be safety, leaving Kame to deal with the approaching enemies-

Then realized that this turn of events meant he'd be fighting his former allies to the (knowing Sankuryu) death, Kame activated stage one, noting the chakra signatures of each of the rapidly approaching enemy ninjas. The larger figure out front attempted to jump over them, but Sankuryu threw out a fist seemingly into thin air- then a thin stream of light bordered in brighter light shot forward and punched a hole through the enemy's chest. They cried out in pain, and then disappeared in a puff of smoke.

 _Shit! A shadow clone!_ However, it was too late, and a stream of wood broke out through the ground and wrapped around Sankuryu. He growled and then moved like it wasn't even there; which, to him, it wasn't. He turned and stepped forward, moving straight through the wood and disintegrating it as he did. Another punch sent forward a long stream of light, barely dodged by Naruko as she passed by. Kame threw a kunai with a paperbomb towards her, but she knocked it out of the air with her own kunai, and then she was disappearing in the direction of Haku, followed by Gunaji and Sureki.

Miriki continued towards them and Kame moved to intercept him, but faltered when he realized that if Miriki didn't catch up then Haku would be alone with Gunaji, Sureki, and Naruko. Instead, he let the Kosuki boy through and threw out a stack of paperbombs while charging up chakra in his hand, then released it: "Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu!"

The blowback launched him backwards from the other approaching genin while sending the paperbombs towards them. The inaccurate spread caused his mass detonation to deliver only minimal damage, but it still disrupted the three remaining genin- Kakuzen, who'd stopped to use his wood release, Zandeina, who'd been forced back to avoid the paperbombs, and Kosu, who moved through the explosions in a smoky state but slowed and then returned to stay next to Zandeina. Again, the loyalty to teammates sent a twinge of regret through Kame, which he immediately stifled mercilessly.

 _Shit, more than half of them got past, and Haku…_ Kame turned and grit his teeth. _I have to end this quickly and go help her._ However, Zandeina seemed to have the same sentiment and ran through a long set of handsigns, then shouted with an intensely angry expression and voice: "Storm Style: Crackling Doom!"

Sankuryu swore and dodged backwards from the expanding lightning. _Does the lightning go through his physical defenses?_ Kame folded and threw two windbombs forward, but Zandeina saw them coming and threw out another jutsu: "Storm Style: Laser Circus!" The stream of lightning tore through Kame's airplanes and kept going, turning towards him. Despite several dodges, the jutsu twisted and turned, keeping straight on course to hit him. For the briefest moment, he felt the lightning rip into his body-

Then it all stopped as Zandeina was forced to desperately roll away from Sankuryu's swing. Thankfully she made no effort to block it, so her last-minute backwards leap saved her from death. Kosu took the opportunity to reform himself and launch a flurry of kunai, but all of them disappeared against Sankuryu's body. _This jutsu is… wait, Orochimaru said he had a seal that was similar to Haku's. Whatever this is, it isn't a jutsu._

Zandeina had to sprint backwards but Sankuryu was far faster, eating up the distance between them rapidly. Kakuzen's attempts to erect wood walls failed completely, and Kosu seemed unable to do anything, but right before the murderous Sankuryu reached her, he reeled backwards and then shot his eyes up towards something airborne. Kame, in a fit of what he thought was intelligence, took the opportunity of the various fighters' distraction to launch weakened paperbombs towards all three of his foes.

He immediately regretted that particular decision as three rock shards shot down from somewhere in the sky above and destroyed the airplanes en-route. Kame finally looked up and saw that the Fifth Tsuchikage was floating above them. _Shit_. The newest great Kage, the fifth Tsuchikage was small in stature, but more than made up for in combat power- legend had it that both of the Hidden Stone's tailed beasts had been captured by her alone. Her long black hair and pink eyes were striking against a robe and vest both colored completely grey.

Then Kame was sprinting to the side in order to avoid a spray of lava coating the ground where he'd stood. _Shit, shit, shit!_ Sankuryu roared in anger and unleashed a barrage of attacks up towards the Tsuchikage, punching through the stone defenses she erected and almost hitting her each time- until Zandeina got her wits back and hit him with a lightning whip. The Tsuchikage narrowed her eyes and then pushed her hands forward, shouting: "Dust Style: Atomic Dismantling Jutsu!"

A cylinder of the same white-edged energy that enveloped Sankuryu's ranged attacks shot forward from in front of her towards him. He growled and rolled to the side just before the cylinder hit and disintegrated the ground where he'd stood, then activated both stage one and stage two of his cursemark. His skin turned greenish, his limbs lengthened, and his hands turned to long, scythe-like claws like a praying mantis'. In a strained voice, he tossed back another order towards Kame: "Deal with the genin." _I can't_ , Kame thought, _that's why you came to help me in the first place-_ "If you don't, we both die."

Then he leaped forward into the air, slashing out in a wide cross-shape that the Tsuchikage barely dodged, disintegrating a huge chunk of a nearby building. Even as the battle between him and the Tsuchikage moved away from the others, Zandeina turned to attack him with the whip again. Kame sent a paper airplane towards her and activated stage two on his own cursemark, attaching a thread of his chakra to the paperbomb. She casually rolled backwards to avoid the path of the airplane, which was a mistake; with a casual yank on the attached thread, Kame pulled the bomb right next to her and put his fingers into the sign to detonate it-

However, then he had to stop making the sign and use his hand to rapidly draw a kunai and defend himself from Kosu's attacks. With one hand stuck managing the paperbomb and another hand engaged in melee combat, he had no real options when Kakuzen threw a wooden growth towards him and simply had to jump away in an attempt to disengage. While forcing chakra into his hand, he saw Zandeina destroy the paperbomb and then aim her hands towards him: "Storm Style: Crackling Doom!"

"Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu!" Kame was blasted back out of the air, hurtling towards the ground. Even as he was falling, he threw out a fan of paperbombs with kunai towards the surrounding buildings. When he landed, Kakuzen already had wooden tendrils shooting towards him, so he detonated the paperbombs and blew apart a few of the shops, sending chunks of rock and earth into the air. Seconds before the attack hit, Kame made the necessary signs while targeting the broken debris: "Substitution!"

Now behind the enemies, he launched a flurry of paperbomb airplanes towards Kakuzen, but the wood style root tendrils split apart and punched into the bombs, forcing Kame to detonate them early rather than lose them. He tossed a few kunai into the air and used stage two to attach chakra threads to them as well, sending them flying towards Zandeina while he ripped a stack of paperbombs from his pocket. Kosu's smoky form engaged quickly but Kame saw him coming: "Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu!"

The blast of wind knocked Kosu back for the moment, freeing Kame up to attach more threads to the paperbombs. _Okay,_ he thought, _here goes nothing_. Zandeina was rapidly destroying the kunai with highly potent lightning attacks, but for the moment Kame could focus most of his efforts on Kakuzen, keeping an eye on the kunai harassing Zandeina. He sent the paperbombs forward, one after the other, moving them around the incoming wooden spikes and up to the wood wall that Kakuzen hastily erected before detonating them. By the fourth blast, the wall was wearing thin, and Kame gleefully focused in for the fifth and sixth blasts, breaking through the defense until a surprised-looking Kakuzen was exposed to the seventh explosion.

 _One down,_ Kame thought, then winced at the callousness of that thought. He didn't have any more time to mourn the probably injury of Kakuzen, though, because Zandeina destroyed the last kunai and finished a long string of handsigns: "Storm Style: Laser Circus!"

 _Alright, this one keeps going and moves where she wants it to,_ Kame remembered. He darted backwards as quickly as he could, moving behind a building seconds before the lightning streamed past him. It continued for a few moments before finally dissipating, but he made the mistake of relaxing and peering around the edge of the building, which gave Kosu the opening to re-engage upon him.

The next few seconds were a desperate flurry of kunai against kunai, but Kame's situation went from bad to worse as he had to take more drastic measures just to avoid getting stabbed. In the end, Kosu knocked the weapon from his hands and pushed it up against his throat, stopping mere inches away from ending his foe's life with a split look on his face. He glanced towards the city's exit, expression pained, and then back to Kame. "Look, can you just stay down?"

Kame swallowed, hesitant to answer. "I…" _I should lie,_ he thought, but it was too late.

Zandeina stepped around the corner and immediately started an offensive jutsu, but Kosu stopped her with his off hand. "No, don't. I don't think Kame wants… I mean, _I_ don't want to kill him."

"Then you're an idiot." Zandeina crossed her arms. "Dako's _out there_ , getting dragged off to god knows where, and you're feeling bad for the enemy?"

"I don't want-"

But the conversation was cut off when the building across the street was demolished. Kosu and Zandeina both half-turned, losing focus on Kame, so he took the opportunity to fold and throw a paper airplane forwards while preparing a jutsu. When the plane sailed between them, the two Cloud genin turned back towards him, but far too late. "Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu!"

Kame was flung backwards and they were flung forwards, closing in on the slow-traveling paper airplane until he detonated it and put them both out of commission. For a brief moment, he felt a pang of violent guilt- _Kosu wanted to spare me, but I put him down without any hesitation… all he wanted to do was save Dako_. Thoughts of the larger cloud genin reminded Kame of Haku's predicament and he charged off towards the chase that was no doubt going on.

Upon exiting the small alleyway he was in, though, he was met with the sight of Sankuryu and the Fifth Tsuchikage facing off against each other in a strange battleground. The stone and wood buildings were destroyed, but rather than rubble, the ruins of the various structures were cut in perfect geometric patterns. The Tsuchikage unleashed another spray of lava, which was dodged and then answered with a flurry of lengthened slashes. Every missed attack vaporized away more of the city.

Suddenly, Sankuryu rolled backwards and spoke: "You're weaker than you were before. I haven't used a single jutsu yet, and you can't get the upper hand? You're a disgrace to the Dust Style, a jealous whore who would condemn a person to death rather than allow them freedom."

The Tsuchikage flew backwards and replied in the same angry voice: "No, _you're_ a disgrace, Sankuryu! You're a traitor who put a stain on out master's legacy forever."

Sankuryu's face twisted in rage. "You pushed me to this. You destroyed me, ruined my life, all because you hoard power." He actually began to sink into the ground, a flat area beneath him disintegrating by the second.

The Tsuchikage betrayed a bit of her own rage: "You betrayed the Hidden Stone! You were going to give the Kekkei Tota, the legacy of my ancestors, to a foreign nation, and in the name of every Tsuchikage before me and every-"

Sankuryu made a guttural noise of anger and charged forwards, running straight through any obstacles in his way as they disintegrated upon touching the aura of white energy before him. _Dust release chakra_ , Kame now realized. _He's like Haku, but uses the Dust Style as his change of nature._ The Tsuchikage responded with her own roar of anger and thrust her hands in front of herself, creating a _massive_ sphere of Dust Style energy that was at least twenty meters wide, and then the two Dust Style techniques collided in a brilliant flash of light and energy.

When it cleared, Sankuryu and the Tsuchikage stood at opposite ends of a huge, perfectly spherical crater carved into the ground and surrounding buildings. Sankuryu seemed to notice Kame and jerked his head towards the direction that Haku had gone, shouting: "Go! Catch up and help her, you idiot!"

Kame nodded and ran off as quickly as he could, unsure of what was going on between the S-class shinobi and who he wanted to win. _Did they seal Sankuryu? But why would they do that if they spent all the time to train him in the Dust Style?_ The whirlwind of thoughts ran through his mind even as he left the larger buildings and entered the rocky valleys that the group of genin must have taken. Worries for Haku spurred him on even faster in his charge, and in only a few minutes he heard the sounds of battle from up ahead.

Upon cresting a larger hill, he froze- Miriki was standing behind Naruko and Gunaji, one hand on each of their shoulders. None of the three were moving, but Miriki was slightly shaking and slumped over. Kame decided to ask about it, creating a clone and sending it forward towards the three of them. "Hey! Miriki, what's going on here, where's Haku?"

Miriki didn't turn, but his response was terse: "Kame. I stopped Gunaji and Naruko when it became clear that they wanted to kill Haku. Right now, time is frozen for them, so when they wake up I'll pretend that Haku just ran and no time had passed. Sureki got away, but I don't think he's as bloodthirsty as they are, so-" He choked off, panting. "This is a lot harder to… keep up than I thought… it'd be…"

Kame dissolved the clone and began stepping around the three genin, moving towards the end of the valley. "Miriki, you're… thank you."

"Don't thank me yet… My idiot brother was the one who broke the damn genjutsu in the first place… Ugh, just go…" Miriki was breathing heavily. "I can't hold this for much longer… and I'm practically gonna be as useless as _you_ when it's gone…"

Kame narrowed his eyes and readied a retort, but swallowed his words and turned towards the forward path- then an idea occurred to him, and he ran through a set of handsigns and imagined a certain boisterous friend of his. "Summoning Jutsu!"

Immediately upon arriving in the human world, Hiro was already talking away. "Oh wow, you finally decided to use me, huh? Not that I'm complaining, I'm supposed to be in school right now, but c'mon, you sure took your sweet time!"

"Huh?" Kame shook his head. _It's only been… what? Two days since I bonded with him?_ "Uh… wait, no, this isn't the time for this. Hiro, I want you to wait here and dismiss yourself once the black-haired girl and the boy with the brown hair start moving. Once you're gone, I'll know that they're a threat-"

"What!?" Hiro was shaking on its little legs. "You _finally_ call me out here, and my big mission is to sit and wait, then run away? C'mon, lemme at 'em, I can take 'em!"

"No, I don't want to kill-" Kame glanced back towards where Haku and the two pursuers had gone. "Look, can you just do this one thing, please?"

Hiro quieted down, then grumbled: "Fine, I'll do it. My next job better be more fun than this one."

Kame took off again, moving off towards the edge of the Hidden Cloud's domain. If he remembered correctly, it was another kilometer or so before the outposts and safety. _Haku, you beat Sureki before, you can do it now. Then we can…_ his thoughts faltered briefly as he realized that, even if they finished this mission, they'd just be given another one. And another after that. The rest of their lives would most likely be these missions, until they died fighting or in their sleep. Somehow, Kame had been ignoring the future and hoping that things would turn for the better, but now he had to-

 _Nope_ , he thought, _I can contemplate the meaning of life later. Right now, I need to catch up to Haku and Sureki_. He succeeded in that far more quickly than he'd expected, coming up on them in only a minute or two and being met with a battle almost as intense as the one in the chunin exams.

Haku had jumped to stage two on her cursemark and, by appearances, the third activation. Just as Kame got within earshot, he heard Sureki yell: "Open, the fourth gate: Gate of Pain!" The slight, thin Leaf genin was now clad in a white bodysuit similar to Rock Lee's, but any lack of intimidation that might have caused was more than compensated for by the extreme amount of chakra emanating from his body. His skin was red and his veins bulged out, the ground cracking slightly under even his unmoving feet. "Haku, I'm taking you back! I won't let you throw away the hopes of Shira!"

"I won't lose to you!" Haku was ten meters away, stage two of her cursemark out and active, causing her to tower over her smaller opponent. "Third Activation: Breath of Speed!" The ground around her fragmented as well, little shards of earth floating upwards by her feet. In unison, the two fighters lowered into ready stances, and there was a brief moment of still and quiet in the clearing.

Kame realized that he should probably intervene, but before the idea fully registered, Haku and Sureki both launched themselves forward hard enough to completely shatter the ground around where they'd stood. Before the broken dust and rock could even begin to fall, they met in the middle- but rather than clashing fists, Haku flashed behind Sureki leaving the purple trail of stage two's instant movement and swung out a kick towards his legs.

Sureki's byakugan must have caught her in time because he jumped over the kick, turning the movement into a spin and swinging an arm forward towards her. She knocked the attack aside and surged forward, catching Sureki with a brutal right hook to the stomach. After a split-second of coughing out blood, he was flung off hard enough to crater into the mountainside, but somehow _still_ got up. Haku tore off towards him, shattering the ground in her path, as he dropped into his own stance, and then the two of them engaged in close-quarters taijutsu.

Haku's pure, unbelievable speed was an unstoppable force to the immovable object of Sureki's grace and skill. Their arms, legs, and even bodies blurred in an exchange of blows that seemed to only grow more violent and fast until Sureki knocked Haku out into the air and shouted, "Sixteen Trigrams: Four Palms!" Haku twisted to avoid the two attacks, but as she landed Sureki was already upon her again: "Sixteen Palms!" Quite a few of them caught her and she staggered backwards, unable to stop the next one, "Sixty-Four Palms!" The barrage of strikes seemed targeted differently than before, more focused on her midriff than the spread he'd used during the tournament.

Haku dropped back, breathing heavily, and Kame stepped forward, determined to help her. He folded together an airplane and threw it out ahead of Sureki, but by the time it arrived he was already attacking Haku, far out of the detonation area. _They're way too fast,_ Kame realized. _I'm useless here…_

Sureki leaped towards Haku, seeming to come from above, but as she raised her arms to defend herself he kicked up a leg and hit her guard, lifting it and dropping himself simultaneously. In her split-second of no guard, he spun into her with another flurry of attacks that turned the air between them into a white-and-blue blur: "Sixteen Trigrams: Two Hundred and Fifty-Six Palms!"

Haku fell backwards, coughing out some of her own blood and dropping her guard completely, although Sureki seemed reluctant to capitalize for some reason. As she shakily raised herself to her feet, he grinned and reassumed his stance, shouting excitedly: "Yes! I was right to choose you!"

"Wha… What?" Haku was now standing seemingly normally, but the weakness in her voice revealed that she _had_ taken significant damage in that last attack. "What do you mean?"

"Rock Lee told me that a key to growing stronger is to choose a rival, someone to measure yourself against and work to surpass!" Sureki's eyes had just a tinge of the fanaticism that his mentor had when he gave his 'power of youth' speeches. "I lost to you once, but it won't happen again. With only my taijutsu, I've surpassed you!"

"I don't think you chose well." Haku dropped into her own fighting stance. "I'm sorry, but you'll never be able to beat me."

"What?" Sureki turned back towards her and narrowed his eyes. "I just discharged enough chakra into your body to disable every muscle you have."

Haku's chakra only blazed more intensely. "You discharged chakra into me, but you never learned about _my_ kekkeigenkai." Sureki stumbled a step backwards in confusion. "I can consume that chakra. Your chakra strikes might have hurt me, but they also fed me your lost chakra." _If that's true_ , Kame thought, _Sureki really did choose the wrong person to have a rivalry with._

"Then it's just more of a challenge. Besides, it doesn't matter, I-" Sureki suddenly choked off as Haku's lightning crackled to life and she thrust a fist forward, sending a stream of the blue-purple electricity into him. The second or so of electrocution was enough for her to close the gap and hit him with a straight leg to his chest, sending him hurtling backwards and upwards. Before he could make much distance, though, Haku activated stage two for the second time and seemingly teleported behind him, leaving a trail of purple coming from where she'd stood. She was already spinning, and when she extended and slammed a leg down into Sureki's back, a visible circle of discharged chakra appeared around her foot and spread out into the air. He was launched downwards hard enough to cover the five meters or so in a split second, losing all traces of any opened gates by the time he landed.

Haku dropped down beside him, shedding her own enhancements, leaving both combatants in their base human states. Sureki was completely out and a trickle of blood ran from his mouth down his cheek, but Haku wasn't in much better shape. Kame finally broke his stupor and surged forward to help her, but before he could get to her she moved over to the still-unconscious body of Dako and slung it over her shoulder.

When she finally noticed Kame, she smiled weakly. "Oh, you're here. Is Sankuryu already ahead, or is he…?"

"He was still fighting someone when I left." Kame's throat felt dry all of a sudden. "Miriki stopped Gunaji and Naruko for us, so we-" Suddenly, a familiar chakra signature winked out of existence as Hiro returned to Uebu Abyss. "Oh, shit."

"What? What is it?" Haku wiped a little smear of blood away from her mouth, sounding and looking worried. "Kame?"

Kame turned back towards the upraised rocks that he'd come from. "They're coming."


	32. Arc 3 Vol 10: Failure Mode

**(A/N) Three arcs down!**

 **Bingo Book Entry: Haku Yorutsume**

Threat Level: A  
Ninjutsu: F  
Genjutsu: F  
Taijutsu: A

Village of Origin: Hidden Sand  
Status: Capture On Sight  
Known Crimes: Treason, Murder (1)

Combat Style: Heavily augmented taijutsu, possible cursemark (unconfirmed), tentails jinchuriki mode

Notes: Genin-rank before attacking the united villages at the chunin exams. After killing one ninja and injuring several more, fled the village. Presumed to be working for Orochimaru. No defense against genjutsu, incapacitation recommended. Live capture preferred, and life-threatening situations may invoke the tentails, so proceed with caution.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Naruko and Gunaji came in hard and fast. As they came over the hill at a high speed, Kame narrowed his eyes and detonated the weakened paperbombs he'd laid in preparation of an attack, enveloping both of them in the resulting blasts. However, mixed in the the slight dark smoke left behind by the paperbombs, Kame saw the white wisps that heralded most summoning or creation jutsu- _Shadow clones, damn it!_

Haku was standing beside him, slightly slumped over and breathing slightly more heavily than normal. _We're in real trouble here_ , Kame thought. _We both used stage two and a huge amount of chakra. If Miriki went too far and collapsed, and we lose, then Naruko and Gunaji might actually kill us._ Despite knowing that if he tried to leave, they'd just run him down, Kame's animal instincts were to flee as fast as he could. To abandon the mission, Haku, and everything else and save himself.

However, rather than doing that, he stood firm and watched as what he could only assume was the real Naruko and Gunaji walk over the top of the hill. Gunaji had four rocks orbiting him, and Naruko- Once again, he nearly looked into her eyes, which would most likely have ended the fight then and there. Instead, he looked back towards Gunaji as the Kokuseki boy started talking: "You're fighting us, then? No more running?"

Kame started to answer but froze in place as a transformation jutsu puffed away from Gunaji and, before he could react, he was staring into the sharingan of Naruko Uchiha. _What!? I'm so stupid, I shouldn't have…_ but it was too late, and she lazily flicked a shuriken towards him. Haku deflected the metal projectile, but for the moment he wasn't able to do anything but stand and look into the Leaf genin's eyes helplessly.

Gunaji threw a hand forward and all of his rocks came zipping towards them, once again forcing Haku to do her best to deflect them rather than dodge. Kame strained desperately, but locked in Naruko's eyes as he was he could only struggle mentally. Haku fell back against the rocks' onslaught but suddenly her eyes flashed and then she hit one with an open hand, sending it flying towards Naruko. Naruko was forced to dodge it, which meant breaking eye contact with Kame, and he took full advantage of the situation by jumping back from the two enemies while folding some more paper in his hands.

Naruko growled in annoyance and made fire handsigns that Kame recognized from the chunin exams, so when she loosed a fireball towards him, he was fully prepared and dodged it carefully. He threw out two paperbomb airplanes towards her, dropped a smokebomb at his own feet, then laid one more paperbomb on his vest and one at his feet before rolling backwards just in time to avoid a rock whizzing past his head. The paperbomb airplanes neared Naruko and he detonated them, though he didn't allow the more-than-hopeful expectation of _that_ managing to take her out to creep into his mind.

As Kame had suspected, that hadn't been enough to knock her out, and she was finishing another jutsu: "Fire Style: Fox Fire!" Ten smaller balls of fire appeared in the air in front of her, then one by one flew towards Haku, who was already on the defensive thanks to Gunaji's rocks. Kame got a little bit too distracted by watching her dodge the attack and failed to notice Naruko using another jutsu: "Shadow Clone Jutsu!"

 _That's pretty bad_ , Kame thought, as he rolled backwards in desperation to see five different Narukos all preparing their own jutsu- even worse, he hadn't kept track of which one was the original. They all finished in unison and together, shouted: "Fire Style: Fox Fire!"

 _Oh, shit_. Fifty little fireballs appeared in the air and then began a barrage towards Kame and Haku, laying waste to the area. Kame dodged the first two, but due to the fact that the clones sent multiple fireballs at a time and they came in waves he was quickly overcome and took a direct hit to his right leg. Through his pain he noticed that Sureki's earlier crash into the mountain had dislodged one larger chunk of rubble that he quickly targeted: "Substitution Jutsu!"

 _Okay,_ he thought, _I'm out of the worst of-_ but with his disappearance, all of the clones targeted in on Haku and she took several hits to her legs and body, collapsing quickly. Gunaji had already used his consolidation jutsu in the middle of the fighting, and now slammed his hands onto the rock in a familiar gesture: "Kokuseki Secret Art: Full Inhabitation!" The rock shattered and the sharp pieces rose into the air before targeting in on Haku and zipping towards her rapidly.

Haku rolled to the side to avoid part of the attack and then darted backwards, but there were just too many of the stone splinters; in fact, even the ones that missed were pulling themselves from the ground in their assault. For some reason, Haku retreated more slowly than she could have, taking the time to knock rocks aside and acting in some strange hybrid of defense and attack. Kame charged towards the fight, pulling out and folding together an airplane, but his rational mind wouldn't let him lie to himself, and all he could think was: _I'm not going to make it_. The rocks just kept coming, swarming around Haku despite her best efforts, then shooting inwards at high speed-

But in a trail of purple energy, she was suddenly out of the killing zone and right in front of one of the Narukos. The horns, size, and claws fully got the message across to Kame; _somehow, she's back in stage two? But I thought she was out of chakra?_ A quick swing of her fist destroyed the shadow clone and she seemed to straighten up; as she continued her movement through where the clone had been she was definitely moving faster. _What's going on…? Wait, is she using the chakra in the rocks as a refuel!?_

However, Kame needed to help her, and he was finally getting back into medium range. As he re-engaged, he noted the distance to the edge of the Hidden Cloud's immediate domain, which was a good kilometer or two away. Leaving definitely wasn't an option; one and a half kilometers was definitely more than enough time for the genin to catch up to them. In a fit of hopefulness, Kame reached for stage one on his cursemark, but to no avail- it was a miracle he had _any_ chakra left at all. _Orochimaru was wrong about some of the aspects of the cursemarks_ , he noted, but then again the Sannin had claimed that they were the first to bear the Life and Death ones.

Kame dropped a windbomb at his feet and reached for his paperbomb-enhanced kunai, but realized that he had none left. _Damn it, that means I'm down to using the paper airplanes_ , he thought, scanning the clearing for good substitution targets. There were none, as the sparse trees were all solid and the hard stone and earth of the mountainsides was packed tight. The one stone he had used already was destroyed, meaning that he was out of free escapes. _It's okay, I can make this work_.

Haku had already destroyed two more of Naruko's shadow clones, but the Uchiha simply made more and substituted with them, keeping her opponent at a distance while pelting her with ranged attacks. Gunaji seemed to finally notice Kame's approach and narrowed his eyes, sending his stone projectiles flying in the beginnings of another attack. Kame took in the whole situation and then smiled, leaping forwards and to the left slightly, then detonating the windbomb and flinging himself through the air.

Gunaji stumbled backwards in surprise, forming a set of seals and then waving another hand towards Kame: "Earth Style: Shattercannon!" The blast of rock splinters came forward as per usual, but Kame knew it was coming and brought his feet up as best as he could, gathering his chakra in the only jutsu he'd ever made up.

"Wind Style: Wind Cushion Jutsu!" The spray of small stones was stopped or even pushed back as Kame did the same, vaulting backwards in midair and landing on his own two feet…. before falling backwards due to momentum and collapsing into a heap. Still, he straightened up quickly and refocused on the battle at hand, suppressing a smile at the sight of Gunaji covered in the broken remnants of his own attack.

Gunaji growled and suddenly, Kame remembered the four larger rocks that he'd dodged earlier, whipping around to see them heading straight for him. Turning was a bad decision, because in doing so he opened himself up to Gunaji's shuriken that buried itself in his back. Mentally cursing, he staggered forward and had to raise a hand, depleting even more of his chakra: "Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu!" The resulting outwards wind pushed him away from the stones, but also in towards Gunaji, who smiled as his body took on a rocky form.

 _I can't win against him in taijutsu_ , Kame remembered, even as he desperately dodged a blow towards his head. Each movement sent another round of pain shooting through the wound in his back, and as he reached over his shoulder to yank out the sharp metal weapon he took a blow to the shoulder from Gunaji. _I'm going to have to use it, aren't I?_

Kame made the proper handsign and detonated the paperbomb on his chest, wincing at the sudden light and heat so close to him, but as it was a directed bomb the blast was pointed towards Gunaji. Even as Kame dodged backwards, he saw the stone-enhanced boy take the blast and waver briefly, but go back to a more firm stance as the stone receded. Kame retreated further, doing his best to avoid collapse at the cacophony of various pains shooting through him with each step. Gunaji closed the distance rapidly and Haku and Naruko were trading evenly for the moment, so Kame was forced to simply run backwards. The Valley genin seemed to sense blood and move faster, eyes flashing as he focused solely on his foe-

And stepped onto the paperbomb that Kame had dropped at the very beginning of the fight, obscured by rubble and dust but still very much active. Kame detonated it and Gunaji was simply blown forwards, wide open for the kunai hilt to the forehead that Kame delivered quickly. _Okay, he's down for the count, so now we just have to deal with Naruko, right?_

Haku looked as haggard as she had before, and Naruko wasn't making any more shadow clones. Due to Haku lacking the speed increase of the breaths and her stances, and seeming being unable to use stage two again, Naruko was able to fend her off and actually touch her arm before disengaging with a smirk right over to where Gunaji's body lay and speaking threateningly: "Okay, now surrender or I kill him."

 _What!? Does she think Haku will surrender because of Gunaji?_ Kame tried to step forward, but Naruko made a shadow clone that pushed him backwards with a fireball jutsu. _What is going on!?_ Haku seemed horrified and muttered, "Kame…"

 _She disguised Gunaji's body as mine, didn't she?_ Naruko seemed to yank a bloodied kunai from her sleeve and hold it next to Gunaji's unconscious body. "I _will_ kill him. He left the damn village to save you, and you can't go back to save him?"

"No! Haku, don't listen to her!" Kame tried to take break out of whatever genjutsu Naruko had her under, but it was no good. Any attempt to move closer was met with the shadow clone's fire jutsu or projectile weapon attacks. _How the hell can I get us out of this situation? First things first, I have to deal with the shadow clone._ Kame charged in towards the shadow clone, unleashing a volley of his own shuriken and kunai that it deflected, but managing to get in to melee combat range.

As it stabbed at his gut, he pushed his own kunai towards its forearm- _I only need to disperse the clone_ , he thought, _not kill a real human_. His much less lethal attack was still damaging enough to destroy the construct before it could hurt him. Kame threw a few shuriken towards Naruko, who narrowed her eyes at him before leaping back from Gunaji's body. Haku made a surprised noise and the stage two alterations melted away from her, the cursemark retreating into its suppressed state once again.

Naruko stood at the other end of the clearing, one arm hanging limp, but still speaking in the superior tone that Kame was starting to suspect was just her normal voice. "Stop, criminals. You've done way more than enough- you hurt my grandfathers, you killed innocent ninja, and now you attacked a great village and probably hurt even more people."

"I had to-" Kame blurted in his own defense before regaining self-control and silencing himself.

"Miriki told me your stupid-ass excuse, and you know what?" Neither Kame nor Haku responded, but Naruko just answered her own question. "It's just proving my goddamn point about this new shinobi world. _What? Oh, no…_ "We had a shot at peace between the villages- real, lasting peace, not this half-assed lie that we have now, and _you_ threw it away because you cared too much about some girl that you probably met a few months ago."

Kame winced, but Haku responded for him. "Do you really want me dead?" she asked plainly, making no effort to conceal the slight quiver in her voice at the personal question.

Naruko narrowed her eyes at the two of them, then shook her head solemnly and pointed at Gunaji's unconscious body. "Did you want _him_ dead?"

 _What? I didn't kill him…_ Kame looked down at Gunaji's bloodied body- but he shouldn't have been bloody, Kame had only hit him in the back with a paperbomb. _So then why is his chest covered in blood, when there's no wound?_ The answer came all too quickly when Naruko's voice trailed over to them: "Sharingan Secret Art: Blood Vengeance." _Shit! That's why she had the kunai near her arm, and why she was acting hurt, she put her own blood on_ \- then Kame's thoughts stopped, and he was standing in his own personal purgatory.

 _Kame was sitting at the edge of the academy yard, wondering why Tetsute and Rakuyo had to both be missing class on the same day. After eating his lunch, he still had a lot of time left over- but what would he spend it doing? He hadn't brought any books or paper, ninja tools weren't allowed in the schoolyard, and-_

" _Hey there!" Kame blinked up, eyes settling on an oddly exuberant boy with long black hair and startlingly blue eyes. "What's your name? Mine's Miriki Kosuki, I'm new here."_

 _Kame looked at the hand like it was a dead animal and then glanced back up towards the still-smiling Miriki. This was the first year for academy students, so everyone in his class was relatively new, but it was also odd for the boy to claim to be new when it was halfway through the year. "Okay…?"_

" _I wanted to know if you wanted to hang out? You looked kinda lonely over here so I just thought that maybe you-"_

 _That was a sore spot for Kame. He'd been isolated almost completely in the years leading up to his academy enrollment, so a reminder of that from a rude kid he'd never met before was upsetting. "Why would I want to hang out with you? I don't even know who you are?"_

 _The unshakeable smile remained, as did Miriki's happy tone. "I'm Miriki Kosuki, like I said before. I just joined the academy, this is my first day, so that's why you probably don't know me at all… do you wanna be friends?"_

 _Kame's eyes widened at the brazen boy. "I know what your name is, but why would I want to be friends with you? Why did you get to skip half a year of training? Are you from another village, or just better than everyone here?"_

 _Miriki laughed at the barrage of questions. "Slow down, I can't keep up. Uhm… I didn't skip any training, it just took me that long to get my mom and dad to let me sign up, dummy."_

 _Kame narrowed his eyes. "Wait, so you're actually behind on training?"_

" _Yeah." Miriki offered the hand again, smiling even wider than he had before._

" _But you're spending the break time trying to make friends instead of training?"_

 _Miriki nodded. "Yeah, I guess I'll catch up, I don't know. That shouldn't take too long, right?" That was the wrong thing to say to Kame, who had spent most of his childhood being pushed into training and reading about what it took to become a shinobi. For Miriki to walk in, declare that it was easy, and think that he could just catch up to Kame without any training was galling to say the very least. Somehow, it got even worse with his next statement: "Plus, my clan's got a super cool Hatogan key key ganky? Kaki gunky? I dunno, but it's an eye thing that only my family can do."_

 _In all of Kame's reading, the most upsetting thing had been the discovery of what it took to become a truly successful ninja- the obscenely powerful kekkeigenkai like the sharingan, magnet release, or kekkei tota, that he'd never be able to attain, no matter how hard he worked. Now this Miriki boy was claiming he had a kekkeigenkai, and the idea that, with his attitude, he might grow stronger than Kame was the last straw._

" _No, I don't want to be your friend!" Kame knocked the hand aside. "Are you sure that you even want to be a ninja? If you're just here to make friends, then go hang out with the girls!"_

 _Miriki's face finally fell, but he put back on the smile almost immediately. "Oh, okay then, thanks for the advice."_

Kame was a passenger in his own mind, and he was rapidly revising what he thought this jutsu did- _It doesn't show you individually traumatic memories, it shows you the memories most likely to invoke negative emotions in your current mind_. He briefly considered the fact that he was still alive- they were probably processing him at the moment, taking him into a prison. It was hard to focus on that, though, as he was sucked into another memory:

" _Hey, can I get some help with this worksheet?" Kame looked up from his desk to see Miriki standing there, expression pleading. "It's confusing me a lot, and-"_

" _No." Kame didn't even want to hear it, especially with Tetsute and Rakuyo sitting beside him. He'd already finished the worksheet in question, but for the lazy Miriki to walk up and ask to copy his work was just insulting. "Do your own work."_

" _But I already told you, I-"_

" _You heard him," Tetsute smirked. "We could do it pretty easily, why couldn't you?"_

 _Kame rolled his eyes. "Probably too busy with some girly stuff." As second year students who were only eleven, girls and boys still kept very much apart, although Miriki was an exception. "Come on, Loverboy, go ask one of your girlfriends for the answers."_

 _A small snicker went through the students close enough to hear the nickname, and Rakuyo's eyes glinted as she noticed the reaction it evoked. "Yeah, Loverboy, you gotta pay the price for being a crappy student. We're not just gonna give you the answers."_

 _Cheeks flaming and now with a new nickname for his efforts, Miriki returned to his seat and either remained oblivious to the mutters surrounding him (or pretended to)._

Kame wished he could hide the ugly truth, but his eyes wouldn't close and his ears wouldn't plug- _I was a bully. I'm at least partially to blame for Miriki's permanent emotional defenses, and… why has he been such a good person to me?_ But before he could reach any conclusions on that question, another memory pulled at his heels and he was swept under.

" _So? How'd it go this time?" Tetsute asked Rakuyo._

 _She smiled. "A lot better. I think Kodoku really learned the lesson-"_

 _Tetsute interjected. "I don't think she's ever learned anything having to do with a lesson, ever."_

 _Rakuyo and Kame both snickered at that, then she continued. "Fine, she got the message and stopped trying so hard, so I can beat her now."_

 _Kame winced a little bit. "But… is it really a first place if you had to…" he was hesitant to say negative things about his friends, but Tetsute seemed to understand his meaning and sighed, long and loud, before responding with the tone of a teacher explaining to a stupid student._

" _Kodoku can't even do any jutsu, so when she gets a first place in the least important subject it defeats the purpose. She can't be a ninja, so for her to get fake hope is a waste of time and attention that Rakuyo could get. Rakuyo could actually use the training, while-"_

" _Hey!" Rakuyo gave him a friendly punch. "Take that back!"_

" _No!" Tetsute and her shared a long staring contest, which was finally broken by a familiar, too-confident voice coming from in front of their bench._

" _Hey, you're welcome to train with me anytime." Miriki was grinning and spreading his arms invitingly, but Rakuyo just sniffed and turned away. "Aww, don't play hard-to-get, c'mon… I just said I'd train with you, didn't I?"_

 _Tetsute stood rapidly and stared the slightly shorter boy down. "I doubt you've done more than eight seconds of training in your entire life, Loverboy, so go find some girl that buys your act and leave Rakuyo alone." Miriki cast one last, wistful glance towards Rakuyo, then turned and started to walk off-_

 _But as he did, Tetsute ran through a set of handsigns and seemed to concentrate, before an incredibly tiny spot of quicksand appeared where Miriki's foot was. The white-clad boy tripped and fell, scuffing up his hands and coat to mild and mostly stifled laughs, before straightening up and shaking his head._

Kame sat for what felt like hours of an endless presentation of every moment in his life he wasn't proud of, every time he'd participated in or supported the bullying that had pervaded Haku and Miriki's childhoods. Every one he watched made him feel a little bit smaller, a little bit less worthy of the respect that they'd both shown him- although, Haku didn't know him, didn't know his role in her torment, didn't know about the genjutsu that was in all likelihood the sole reason he'd changed into the person he was now.

Eventually, the genjutsu wore off and Kame found himself keeled over, arms and legs bound tightly and preventing any real movement. Remembering the lecture on what to do when captured, he did his best to pretend that he was still unconscious, slowly taking in his situation fully as best he could. Haku was still knocked out, Naruko was sitting there facing them, although through his slitted eyes he couldn't tell exactly what she was doing- not that it mattered, because she immediately saw through his deception. "Hey, Kame, back so soon? Your life must have been a damn breeze, huh? That's the fastest I've seen someone break out yet!"

Kame realized then that for him to act hurt by that jutsu was hypocritical and weak- _Haku saw things that were a thousand times worse and… well…_ the thought caused him to wince. _Okay, bad example, but still: I need to find us a way out of this, now_. "Why go this far? Why would you hunt us down like this?" _I need to keep her distracted while I see if I can break these restraints_.

"Again with the 'why me?' bullshit? You're a missing-ninja that attacked the village I was in, and you're seriously gonna try to pull the victim act here!?" _She isn't wrong_ , Kame considered. _It's just that that doesn't change the fact that I need to keep her talking, so…_

However, before he could try another verbal tack, Haku woke up from her genjutsu gasping and wild-eyed. For the briefest moment, Kame was afraid that she might lose control over her seal again, but the thought passed quickly as she collapsed and turned to look at Naruko. The Uchiha's smirk didn't waver in the slightest as she leered at the two of them. "Oh, now you're awake, too."

Haku didn't respond for a long time, finally responding in a quiet, personal tone: "You shouldn't dismiss Sureki so much. He really cares about you."

Whatever Naruko had been expecting to hear, that wasn't it. After a brief, almost-comical expression of surprise, she pushed the smirk back onto her face. "Who're you to lecture me about relationships, _Kodoku_."

At that name, Haku flinched a little bit, and Naruko pressed her advantage. "Yeah, that's right, me and a few of your Sand buddies swapped stories. Turns out I lost to the class dead-last, which is…" she let out a dry laugh. "A little annoying, to say the least."

Kame attempted to speak up in Haku's defense: "Tetsute and Rakuyo aren't… she was actually… You weren't there, so…" His mind failed him as the words refused to come, leaving him to just trail off pathetically and hope that Haku didn't take it the wrong way. _What's wrong with me? Am I still shaken up from that genjutsu?_

A man appeared behind the Leaf genin, moving so silently that at first Kame thought he was simply imagining things. However, as he got closer, he was revealed to be Mujina, the jonin from the meeting that had pushed for Haku's execution. Once he closed the final distance and stood inches from Kame, he peered down with narrowed eyes and then drew a long, curved sword from a sheath on his belt.

"Excellently done, Leaf genin. I will formally commend you and recommend your immediate advancement to chunin-rank once the mission is complete. Now, did you use the same memory jutsu that initially triggered her loss of control on her again in this fight?" _Why would he care about that?_ Kame should have been horrified at the presence of a jonin, but for the moment he distracted himself with curiosity as to the man's motives. He reached down and seemed to tap Haku's stomach for some reason as Naruko reoriented herself.

"Yes, I did. She didn't let out the tentails, if that's what you're asking." Naruko seemed to notice Mujina's intent and rapidly kept talking. "But I'm not sure if she has full control yet, because she'd already had those memories… why don't you kill her friend as a final test of her ability to manage it?" _What!?_

Mujina turned and raised his sword over Kame. "I agree. He's a criminal, so we're well within our rights to put him down; we've already recovered the jinchuriki and your teammate." Kame strained his neck to see that Sureki and Dako were not lying where they'd been earlier. "Well, any last words?"

 _What… is this actually happening!? I can't die here, can I?_ Kame's mind scattered, terrified and confused- but a strange calm quickly overtook his thoughts, an acceptance of death that simultaneously soothed and scared him. "Good luck, Haku."

The sword lifted above him, and he squeezed his eyes shut for long seconds, then opened them to see Mujina stepping back carefully, Naruko concentrating on something, and Haku looking at him with wide eyes that were rapidly filling with tears. _They put her under a genjutsu of me dying as the real test… but then, do I try to interrupt it? This might be her only chance to prove that she's not a danger to the ninja world._

The decision was taken out of his hands when she let out a cry of despair that quickly grew in volume as black smoke emerged from her shuddering body. _Oh, no, she's losing it_ , Kame thought, with less horror than he'd assumed would come. Her bonds snapped, one after the other, and the purple chakra cloak grew over her entire body as she straightened up, although it wasn't solid enough to cover up her face. Her closed eyes snapped open, revealing inwards spirals of purple and black, and a single tail emerged from behind her.

Mujina made a noise of disappointment. "That's… well, to be expected, really. The directives are clear as to my next action." He lowered himself, bending his back leg with the front leg stretched out before him, and raised the sword to be horizontal beside his head.

Haku turned to look at him and started to move, but before she could even take a single step he dashed faster than the eye could see and was sheathing his sword on the other side of her: "Flying Raijin Slice." Kame had to look over at where he'd gone, then at where he'd stood, confused about what exactly had just happened, only to see Haku collapse with a wound in her side and the tentails cloak fade; but not into her seal. The purple chakra sank back into her skin wherever it was until all of it was gone, leaving her injured and in a heap. _He's… so fast. Isn't that one of the Hidden Leaf's secret techniques?_

As Haku fell to the ground, with her fell Kame's final hope for escape or rescue. _We're done for_ , he thought, just as Sankuryu came tearing out of the forest and cut Kame's bonds, shouting, "Go!" as he ran.

Kame reacted quickly instead of his usual semi-confusion when faced with sudden changes in situation, dashing to Haku while readying his own jutsu. Just as he grabbed hold of her, Mujina appeared right in front of them- if Kame hadn't already been releasing his jutsu, they both most likely would have died. As it was, in the split-second between the jonin's teleporting and slashing, Kame released the pent-up chakra: "Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu!"

He held tight to Haku and they were sent flying as Mujina was flung away from them, in another fit of luck landing against Naruko and giving Kame time to struggle to his feet and stare helplessly at Haku. _I can't leave her, but I also can't_ -

She straightened up slowly and then began running on her own, leaving Kame to follow behind her. However, they were both injured and damn-near completely exhausted, so Kame was faced with the realization that they'd be run down and most likely killed by an angry Mujina. _Please, please, please, let us escape._ He hoped beyond hope, even as Mujina appeared beside Haku once again and began his slash that both of them were far too tired to dodge.

His prayers were answered not by a god, spirit, or angel, but by a long grey spine that almost hit Mujina right between the eyes. The man had to raise his sword in desperation, barely blocking the incoming projectile, which gave Kame time to turn and run a little more-

But Haku had darted back past him to attack Mujina. The jonin was far faster than her, but he was also off-balance and watching for incoming arrows, so she was able to land a solid blow to his side that knocked him backwards slightly. Before he knew what he was doing, Kame had joined in as well, throwing two kunai towards Mujina's less-defended chest. One was deflected, but in order to avoid the other, Mujina had to use another Flying Raijin in order to blink behind Haku, and even then he didn't have time to attack, only to deflect another arrow coming straight for him.

 _We can't kill him, but maybe we can..._ Kamereadied what was left of his chakra in his hand even as Haku re-engaged once more. He charged in towards the fight, raising a hand once he was within five feet of the enemy: "Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu!"

The pathetic blast of wind, a product of his last tiny dregs of chakra, failed to do much more than knock Mujina back and slightly disrupt his careful attacks. However, the shuriken that followed behind it, coupled with Haku's own kick, as well as an incoming arrow from behind him, meant Mujina had to once more teleport with his Flying Raijin...

But this time, Kame's slight movement of him had put him between Haku and Seikaku. The arrow, whizzing in at his head height, continued forward when he teleported, but he teleported directly behind Haku- right back into the arrow's flight path. It wasn't a clean shot to the head, but the grey quill burying itself nearly a foot deep into Mujina's chest was enough to knock him down hard. Kame couldn't tell if that had been enough to kill the man, but it was definitely enough to stop him from chasing any further, so he turned to Haku and fled alongside her.

No other pursuit appeared, but that didn't mean that the two of them slowed their pace at all. They kept running, as quickly as they could in their crippled state, for the kilometer or so until they reached Orochimaru and the three Sound Ninja Four members. Then, and only then, did Kame allow himself to drop to his knees and fully consider how close he and Haku had come to death-

But even that was short-lived, and soon Orochimaru ordered them to their feet as they retreated from the site of their abject failure.


	33. Arc 4 Vol 1: Settling In

**(A/N) So, for the record, the current five main Kage are: Darui, Naruto, Gaara, Gakutsuchi (the Tsuchikage), and Korekuta (the Mizukage). Naruto and Gaara are both very, very old, as are all the living members of their generation, but I figure if Hiruzen can lead the Leaf during original Naruto at age 70, then they can do the same, especially considering that it's peacetime in this universe.**

 **Ninja Profile: Korekuta Terumi**

Ninjutsu: S  
Genjutsu: A  
Taijutsu: B  
Specialties: Lava Release, Boil Release, Mud Release, Ice Release

Description: Korekuta is young for a Kage, aged only twenty-four, and has the same brown hair and green eyes as his 'mother' Mei Terumi. He typically wears a long, blue coat and rainboots, both of which tend to get somewhat dirty due to him generally not caring about being wet or filthy.

Origin: Korekuta was raised by Mei Terumi in her old age, and although his father is unknown, they must have been an extraordinary ninja. From even his childhood he displayed an extraordinary aptitude for ninjutsu and demonstrated over the years an ability to use not two, not three, but _four_ separate kekkeigenkai, all of which he mastered to a devastating effect. When Chujuro passed, he was chosen as a shoe-in for the position of Mizukage, achieving levels of strength and popularity in his village rivaling those of Minato Namikaze in the Hidden Leaf.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

 **(Six Months Later)**

Sankuryu made four quick swings of his hands, cleanly cutting through the solid steel door and kicking it inwards. Kame inhaled sharply as the room on the other side was revealed to hold a group of Hidden Mist ANBU waiting for them, and flinched back as they finished whatever jutsu they'd prepared. He never got to know what would have happened if they'd actually released it, because at that exact moment the roof above them groaned and collapsed, dumping acid, slime, and half-melted stone down onto them. There were a few short seconds of screaming, and then just the hiss of acid melting further and Hiretsuna's gurgled laughter as he dropped down to follow his handiwork.

"Heh, didja see that? They didn't even know what hit 'em!" He dropped a hand into the puddle of viscous acid and sucked it away, draining it into himself to clear the way for the other Sound ninja. Sankuryu crossed the room quickly and Kame followed, trying not to think about what Haku and Orochimaru were doing at the moment. _It's just the Mizukage, and she's not even the strongest Kage… plus, it's not like they're killing her, just diverting her and her guards from protecting the prison_. Still, he couldn't fully stifle the nervous feeling in his gut, even as they reached their target location.

In a dark, damp cell, deep underneath the Village Hidden in the Mist, sat an unnamed, elderly ninja. The man was in chakra-suppression chains all over his body, which struck Kame as strange given how harmless and tired he looked. Sankuryu struck through the bars over his cell and stepped into it, speaking in a straight-to-the-point tone: "You are to come with us."

The man looked up and smiled with his mouth, but his eyes were strained as wide as they could open and his voice was quivering with intense emotion to the point of insanity. "You've come for me, how nice, but you're too late. I'm nothing but a ghost, Yagura! A ghost, like you are!"

 _Okay_ , Kame thought, _so this guy is just completely insane_. All Orochimaru had told him about the target was that they were ancient, kept alive beyond their years by various jutsu for research and information. _Looks like that took a toll_. At Sankuryu's motion, Kame remembered his own role and stepped forward, pressing a card against the prisoner's forehead. The seal on the card faded and reappeared on the bare skin, then caused the man to slump over completely unconscious.

Sankuryu slung the man over his shoulder and moved back towards the way they'd come, Hiretsuna staying out ahead of them to make sure that nobody else interfered. Kame trailed, doing the same thing but watching the rear for any surprise attacks instead of the front, but none came and they made it out of the underground fortress without any real trouble. Their first challenge came when they exited out into the village and found themselves surrounded on all sides by mist. Kame's cursemark-enhanced senses scanned through the mist, although it was all infused with chakra that would probably work against any visual penetration. The dark night and thick fog most likely made any attempt to see more than five feet futile.

Then he sensed the approaching enemies from behind them and whirled around. _Their chakra isn't very strong, are they civilians?_ However, as Kame tossed out a windbomb in front of him and detonated it to scatter the artificial fog, he was met with the sight of three children holding shuriken and kunai- Academy students. A quick backwards glance revealed Hiretsuna stopping and turning around, and Kame knew that if his superior laid eyes on the three kids, they'd be completely done for.

It took him as a surprise, then, when he didn't panic at all, even as Hiretsuna dropped back and launched an acid bullet towards them. Frozen first by apathy and then by disgust with himself, Kame was too deep in thought to do anything even as the glob of destructive green fluid reached the one out front. Too late, he cried out and started to move forward-

Only to be caught in a the wave of green mist that the child's form exploded into, with two subsequent explosions from the other ones. Out of instinct, he held his breath and retreated rapidly until he was standing beside Hiretsuna and Sankuryu, scanning for chakra in the mist. He felt movement off to his left and threw out a windbomb airplane for a good distance before making the handsigns to detonate it, but no explosion came. Kame glanced down at his hands in confusion and wasn't looking forwards when three shuriken flew from the rapidly approaching edge of the fog.

Sankuryu dumped the unconscious prisoner and darted forward to block the shuriken, his dust stance making short work of them. However, right after them came the form of a Mist ninja wearing a round mask and holding-

 _Oh, shit._ The man was holding the Executioner's Blade, swinging it down towards Sankuryu's head. The Sound ninja raised an arm almost lazily, but instead of finishing his swing the attacker expertly reversed his grip and spun, sweeping the sword in a low arc towards Sankuryu's feet. Instead of disintegrating, when the blade hit Sankuryu's soles it cleaved them to the side, dropping him awkwardly downwards and sideways. Even as he fell, another, much larger and burlier masked Mist ninja came flying in from the mist and swung a huge sword downwards towards his body.

Inches before hitting him and dissolving, it flashed brightly and then exploded, covering both figures in a fiery blast. _That's another one… the Explosive Blade. They sent two of the seven swordsmen just to deal with us!?_ When the light and smoke cleared, Sankuryu appeared to be covered in a rocky shell that quickly dissolved away back into the faint glow of his Dust stance. _Clever_ , Kame realized, _he used the earth stance to lessen the blow and then jumped back into Dust stance afterwards_. However, the two swordsmen just silently hopped back to stand beside each other, unfazed by Sankuryu surviving their combination attack.

Hiretsuna spoke with clear glee. "Looks like we get to have some fun after all, eh, Sankuryu?" Despite the lack of response, he just smiled wider and kept going. "Ah well, I guess yer playin' the cool guy here, but I know yer happy. After this, yer little group'll have to be called the _five_ ninja swordsmen of the Mist!" His loud laugh quickly devolved into a coughing fit.

The laughing stopped when the Executioner's Blade wielder pounced forwards, making a series of signs that condensed the mist around them into three exact copies. The man spoke in a low, gruff voice: "Water Style: Water Clone Jutsu!"

The first two water clones charged in and swung towards Hiretsuna, who evaded their initial attacks without much effort. That gave Sankuryu time to come in and destroy both of them using quick, efficient taijutsu strikes. The final clone leaped over them but Sankuryu turned and engaged on the real one instead of following it. Kame threw out two paperbomb airplanes towards the clone and moved a little bit closer, determined to help even though he was thoroughly outclassed by the combatants.

In mid-air, the clone was suddenly replaced by a larger, thicker form- the Explosive Blade user had substituted with it. One quick swing of his weapons blasted both Sankuryu and Hiretsuna with a huge explosion, and he landed easily while the weapon click and then shot out a new scroll of paperbombs onto its blade. Kame was momentarily distracted by the sheer awesomeness of that mechanism: _the blade re-arms itself with paperbombs, probably from an internal dispenser. I wonder if it has a bunch of pre-cut lengths of the bombs, or if it has one long sheet of paper that gets put out onto the blade bit by bit. How many times could_ -

His wonder nearly caused him to miss the window for detonating his own airplanes, but thankfully he snapped back to reality in time and blew them up right next to the swordsman's back. The resulting explosion was relatively unimpressive and actually failed to kill the man, just shredded a chunk of his cloak to reveal the heavy armor he wore underneath. He whipped around angrily and looked directly at Kame, who swallowed nervously and stepped back in fear, but before the confrontation could go any further Hiretsuna's chakra-cloaked arm shot out and punched the swordsman hard enough to fling him off into the fog.

Sankuryu, covered in his rocky armor, and Hiretsuna, covered in the sickly green chakra of the sixtails, had both survived the blast. However, the Executioner's Blade wielder and one water clone came running towards them silently. Kame shouted, "Look out! Guys!" but not quickly enough, as the metal blades cut deep into both of the Sound ninja. Sankuryu coughed out blood as he took the edge of the blade nearly two inches deep into his stomach, while Hiretsuna yelled in rage as the blade cut through his chakra cloak and stabbed into his chest.

Hiretsuna vomited a spray of acid onto both of the attackers, but as they melted away they lost color and form, splashing into a dilute, watery mixture around the feet of the two injured Sound ninja. _Both water clones? But that means that Sankuryu and Hiretsuna are hurt, while the swordsmen are…_ Kame scanned the fog with his senses, but neither of the Mist ninja were out near their injured targets. A more casual, wide-area scan revealed the signature of at least one of them-

 _Shit!_ Kame dropped a windbomb and leaped forward while charging up chakra in his right hand. Remembering how his lucky timing back during the Cloud raid had saved his life, he waited for the Executioner's Blade holder to charge forward, let him close in as close as he dared, and then finally detonated the windbomb to send himself and the enemy flying away at high speeds. More stage one sensing revealed another water clone in the air above him, but the chakra in his hand had charged up enough. "Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu!"

The clone was flung skyward as Kame plummeted, but before crashing into the stone he got his feet out underneath him and channeled his chakra once more: "Wind Style: Wind Cushion Jutsu!" The fall was slowed enough for him to land on his feet and stay on them while scanning for any more incoming attacks; although the chakra-sensing was somewhat unnecessary given that the Explosive Blade user was directly charging him. The huge man's round white mask, carved with a red flame, did a good job of hiding his emotions up until he roared in rage and brought the deadly sword around for another swing.

Kame sensed Sankuryu and Hiretsuna moving back behind him and decided to stop the Mist ninja's onslaught, activating stage two on his own cursemark. While the transformation failed to elicit a reaction of any sort from the incoming attacker, it did give Kame enough power to step forward and send his chakra towards the huge sword. He felt the explosive seals inscribed onto the paperbombs and viciously tore through them, disabling them all in one move while preparing a jutsu of his own.

The final handsign finished, he raised his hands to his mouth. _They've been using the mist for their attacks since the fight started, it's my turn now_. "Fire Style: Burning Ash Jutsu!" As he exhaled chakra from his mouth, it transformed into a smoke cloud that filled the air before him. He prepared chakra in the air before him using stage two while also pulling a firebomb out from his pocket with his right hand and pushing even more chakra into the palm of his left.

As expected, the Explosive Blade user came running out from the cloud of ash with a vengeance, swinging his sword downwards viciously. Kame simultaneously tossed the firebomb towards the cloud, threw a hand up to attach as many chakra strings as he could to the disarmed sword, and finished gathering chakra over his head. The larger Mist ninja had just enough time to click something on his sword, detach a couple dozen useless pieces of paper that failed to explode, then look up at it and grunt out, "Huh?" before Kame released the chakra he was holding above himself and on the blade.

"Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu!" Kame unleashed the blast of air that sent his enemy flying, making sure to stick his own feet to the ground using chakra and bracing himself. As the man disappeared into the smoke cloud, another handsign detonated the firebomb within it and the whole thing went up in a blaze of flames. The creeping mist was blown back once again, and as the smoke cleared to reveal the clear area left behind by the blast with the Explosive Blade wielder standing in the middle. His cloak was blown off almost completely, leaving behind plated metal armor covering a large, muscle-bound man in chainmail.

However, rather than collapsing like Kame expected, the man simply put the blade back into a ready position and started speaking: "You're good for a genin, but if that's your ace in the hole, you're done for."

Kame swallowed, trying not to be intimidated, and thought through his situation. _Even though I caught him in an explosion of fire, he's just standing there like nothing happened, talking at me- wait a second, he's talking. He hasn't been talking at all since the fight started, which means that if he's doing it now, then…_ Kame threw himself forward on an instinct and felt the wind pressure of a large object whoosh just over his head. A half-turn revealed his fears to be true: the Executioner's Blade holder was behind him. _He suppressed his own chakra signature and sound!?_

That would have almost definitely been it for Kame, were it not for Sankuryu and Hiretsuna managing to recover enough to rejoin the fight. Hiretsuna had engaged both stages of his cursemark, allowing him to turn himself into acid and back again, which should have allowed him to reconstruct himself. Sankuryu, on the other hand, was pale and bloodstained, moving much more slowly than normal, although that didn't stop him from engaging forwards onto the Executioner's Blade user while Hiretsuna called forth a fifth tail. The Explosive Blade user charged, but Hiretsuna dissolved into glowing green acid and streamed forward across the ground, growing by the second but forming a circle of clear ground around Kame and Sankuryu.

Kame could feel stage two beginning to wane, his chakra reserves annoyingly low already from all the jutsu he'd deployed; but he'd seen these same four ninja fight just a bit earlier and knew what the outcome of another clash would be. Sankuryu seemed reluctant to use his cursemark for some reason, which meant that he wasn't going to be able to put out any more. The Executioner's Blade wielder was dodging around his ranged attacks, avoiding each one with careful feints while growing inexorably closer, some sort of jutsu surrounding his feet and purifying the acid into water.

Meanwhile, Hiretsuna was faring slightly better against the Explosive Blade user, but the Mist ninja didn't appear to be anywhere close to running out of ammunition on his sword, and he was able to dodge or blow away all of the slow-moving acid attacks. Kame let out a long breath and then tossed a six pieces of paper into the air, attaching smaller chakra threads to them and folding them into more aerodynamic shapes before replacing the threads with stronger ones and moving them forwards. He sent four of them coming from all directions towards the Executioner's Blade user while throwing a kunai above him with his hands to prevent an escape to the air. The man appeared to glance around at the omnidirectional attack and then ran through a quick set of handsigns: "Water Style: Water Shuriken Jutsu!"

Five shuriken condensed from the still-damp air and flew outwards, four of them towards the airplanes and one of them towards Sankuryu, who had been closing in to attack him. Sankuryu's Dust stance made short work of the water, but Kame was forced to drop the planes under the incoming missiles. As he dropped them, the swordsman lowered and spun his sword, cleanly cutting through all of them in a single revolution as Kame wasn't skilled enough to micromanage them _that_ much.

However, he did have another one coming at the man from above, and it appeared to be on-course- until the man used a single hand to, in one smooth motion, catch and fling Kame's own kunai up into it and break it. That left only one airplane in the air, which was skirting very low and close to the acid. Sankuryu finally entered melee range and began his long-swinging, graceful taijutsu style, forcing the Executioner's Blade user to drop back on the defensive and focus on dodging for the moment.

As they fought, though, it was visible that Sankuryu's injury had taken its toll and that he was slowing even more by the second. The Executioner's Blade user even had time to throw together a few handsigns between evasions: "Water Style: Water Clone Jutsu!" A clone appeared off to the side but fell in the acid and disappeared almost immediately. Even worse, for the Mist ninja's trouble he ended up accidentally letting Sankuryu come in too close and lost a massive chunk of his sword in a desperate retreat. Kame narrowed his eyes in concentration and sent the final plane moving upwards towards the man's back-

"Substitution Jutsu!" _What!?_ Kame saw a the Mist ninja's position change suddenly and lose its chakra signature- _No_ , he realized, _it's still there, but… it's like he lost almost all of his chakra all of a sudden…_ Then he sensed the real chakra descending from above him and understood what had happened: _He made a one-percent water clone up in the sky, so I couldn't sense it, and then substituted with it!_

Realization was not the same as being able to stop it, and Kame was forced to desperately move forwards while turning to see what sort of defense he'd have to erect- only to hear "Shuriken Water Clone Jutsu!" and see a flurry of shuriken flying at him. Using what little stage two chakra he had left, he threw chakra threads onto as many of them as possible, catching most of them but not all and sustaining minor cuts to his thighs and forearms. Ignoring the pain as best he could, he threw the shuriken back towards the swordsman- or, where the swordsman had been, because as stages one and two both receded away into Kame's cursemark, he was left with only his eyes to scan through the returned mist.

Stranded on his little island atop the acid and unable to use dust release to walk through it, Kame had to pull out a paperbomb and start to attach it to his chest in case the man closed into melee range. That may have saved his life, because a shuriken came flying out of the mist and cut into his fingers and the paper before weakly landing against his chest. It was followed by the Executioner's Blade wielding swordsman, who moved far quicker than Kame could hope to counter and swung the half-size sword around towards his chest.

 _I can't fight him in melee- but that's not really a goddamn option right now_. Kame's life was saved by Sankuryu again as the Sound ninja sent out a ranged strike, briefly lighting up a thin line of white energy. The swordsman managed to avoid the attack by twisting his body aside before the targeted area flashed and barely missed hitting him, but due to the last-minute dodge Kame was able to avoid a lethal hit from the sword strike. Instead, the blade cut deep into his upper arm and he cried in and fell to the ground.

Once again, that might have been the end, but as the Executioner's Blade user raised the sword for a finishing blow, he snapped his eyes upwards and then cut through the air ridiculously quickly. Kame was confused as to why he would swing at nothing until he saw the broken fragments of a dark bone splintering and falling to the ground. _Seikaku_ …

The man narrowed his eyes and then began to back off, moving slowly as he furiously swung through the air, looking for all the world like he was shadow boxing except for the fragments of bone that kept appearing and showering the area around him. He barked out an order to the other swordsman: "Retreat, now!"

The Explosive Blade holder looked at him confusedly and then jerked backwards in surprise as a long, black arrow punched straight through the armor over his arm. He swore loudly and then followed the order he was given, moving backwards cautiously. Kame didn't even move until both of them were far out of sight, then Hiretsuna growled. "Let's get 'em."

"No." Sankuryu moved over to a nearby alley and retrieved the still-unconscious target, slinging the man over his shoulder and then moving off towards their exit route. Kame looked around at the mild destruction their battle had caused, taking solace in the fact that the civilians seemed to have evacuated and most of the main forces were off doing a drill of some sort. That was the reason Orochimaru had ordered the attack- whatever this man they were capturing was, he was normally much better guarded.

As they continued towards the exit unimpeded, Kame heard a loud explosion and a crumbling building from off where Orochimaru and Haku were causing a diversion and once again couldn't help but worry about her safety. _The defenses are lower, sure, but… two of the seven swordsmen fought us and they nearly won. There are seven, total, which means Orochimaru and Haku were taking on five_. He remembered the original plan and loosened up a little bit- _Seikaku was helping Orochimaru and Haku, so if she left to help us, then that means the other two probably have things under control_.

They exited the village having met only three more chunin. Two had died almost immediately by taking arrows to their heads, while the third had run away, leaving them to escape the village and wait at the rendezvous point. Seconds ticked away into minutes, and after half an hour Kame started to panic- _maybe Seikaku left because they lost. Maybe the Mizukage and seven ninja swordsmen were too much for them…_

But those fears were ultimately unnecessary as Orochimaru approached from off to the side, a snake trailing behind him with a limp and pale Haku in its jaws. Kame stepped forward, heart pounding in his chest as the blood rushed to his head- this was just like their first attack on a village, six months ago, when Haku had come close to death. Now here they were, exiting another village after another capture mission, where Haku had been in over her head and fighting enemies beyond her level, and Kame could only watch as the snake dropped her unceremoniously onto the grass before disappearing back to its home dimension.

Kame started to ask about Haku but bit his tongue, watching the rise and fall of her chest as a reassurance that she wasn't dead. Over the last six months, he'd learned all too well what came of questioning Orochimaru or noting any failure of his- _then again, he can't really hurt Haku now, can he?_ Instead of mirth, though, all that that joke to himself drew out was a wince and more fear.

Orochimaru nodded to Sankuryu, glanced at their prisoner, and then ran through a set of handsigns before saying: "Group Reverse Summoning Jutsu!" Kame returned to the base, feeling… well, stifling his feelings. He had to worry about Haku at the moment, so feelings could be dealt with later.


	34. Arc 4 Vol 2: Betrayal

**(A/N) I really, _really_ wanted to use the black hole analogy for what the tentails has turned into, but I'm not sure if astronomy has progressed that far in the Naruto world, so...**

 **Ninja Profile: Kubikiri**

Ninjutsu: A  
Genjutsu: A  
Taijutsu: A  
Specialties: Executioner's Blade, Deception, Tactics

Description: Kubikiri has a normal height and build, wearing a white mask of the Seven Ninja Swordsmen emblazoned with a red drop of blood in the center. His clothing is typically black underneath the customary vest of a Mist village jonin, and his mannerisms both in and out of combat suggest an extreme level of caution and attention to detail in almost everything he does.

Origin: Kubikiri was a by-the-book student all the way through his schooling, unremarkable except for his dutiful and incredibly precise execution of anything he was told to do. Eventually promoted to chunin and then to jonin, when the Seventh Mizukage ascended to their position and recreated the Seven Ninja Swordsmen, Kubikiri was a natural choice for the leadership role. After receiving his promotion, he has earned the title 'Master of the Seven Swords' not for his skill at swordsmanship but for the almost unprecedented success rate of missions that he led. It is said that the Hidden Mist's second jinchuriki was captured by the Seven Swordsmen under his command.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Grandmother was waiting for them when they arrived, immediately applying a seal to Haku that lifted her off the ground and then moving off after Orochimaru. None of the ninja said a word, each one splitting off in their own separate directions, so Kame was left with no option but to tag along behind the silent Sannin. They went off down several more tunnels, going so long without speaking at all that when Grandmother finally broke the silence and started talking, Kame leaped back in surprise. "Don't look so sad, dearie, I'm sure that your friend will be alright."

Kame calmed his rapidly beating heart and took a couple deep breaths before forcing a smile and responding: "Thank you for saying that." He wanted to say more, but instead lapsed into a silence that lasted all the way to the room that Orochimaru had originally studied Haku's seal in.

Memories of that first time kept mingling with what was right before his eyes, and with his voice suppressed all he could do was overthink. _It's more than just this situation- the last mission was like the one to the Cloud, and Haku being hurt is just like…_ Kame rocked back a little bit as he realized just how many times that Haku had been injured before his eyes. _This is killing us. If Orochimaru doesn't decide to put us down, eventually we'll die to one of our targets or to a team from a Great Village._

 _I can't stop it_. He told himself what he'd been repeating since originally coming to this god-forsaken lair. _It's too late, and this was all set into motion when Haku- no, I can't blame her when she already blames herself so much. This began when her family sealed that thing inside her and got worse when I let Naruko beat me and move on to fight her_. Orochimaru's loud hiss of annoyance brought Kame's eyes up to see what was going on, and he was met with the sight of purple light emanating from the seal.

Acting on instinct, he activated stage one and was met with… he couldn't describe it. _She normally looks like nothingness, a blank slate, but this is somehow even more empty than that. It's like… not a lack of chakra, but a need for it_. The evil presence was emanating from the seal on her back and Orochimaru seemed to be fighting it, pushing it back despite heavy resistance. Their shoving match finally ended with Orochimaru thrusting both hands downwards onto her back and banishing the evil chakra down into her.

Haku immediately seemed to awaken and Kame averted his eyes for what he felt was an adequate amount of time before finally turning back and speaking to Orochimaru carefully. "Lord Orochimaru, I… what happened?" _Good, there's no way that he can take that the wrong way, right?_

Orochimaru responded tersely: "A process that most likely began with the failed Cloud mission six months ago has progressed to a breaking point."

Kame swallowed the urge to pepper him with questions and prioritized them in his head, then finally decided on one to ask. However, Haku beat him to it with her own distressed-sounding inquiry: "What happened? Does it have to do with the tentails?"

Orochimaru turned to her, still expressionless but with noticeable strain in his voice. "You did not mention that the tentails' emergence six months ago ended with a dispersal rather than a sealing of its chakra."

Kame tried and failed to make sense of that statement, already forgetting what his earlier question was and deciding on a new one. "Is Haku going to be alright?"

"If you're speaking of her health, then yes." _What's the catch?_ Kame waited as Orochimaru seemed to think for a few seconds before continuing. "However, when the tentails emerged before, it wasn't forced back into its cage. Instead, it expanded into the realm between the prison seal and the chakra suppression seal, eating away at what it could; Haku's own chakra." Kame's breath hitched as he realized the reason for Haku's slow decline in effectiveness over the previous months- _that monster was eating her alive from the inside, and I didn't even notice_ \- "I've forced it back into its seal, but…

"It's changed. The extra chakra taken from your kekkeigenkai's draining was siphoned into it, and it…" he seemed to search for the right word "-Fused with your bloodline. Any attempt to use your kekkeigenkai in the future will require you to let out a bit of the tentails." _But that's not an option_ , Kame thought. _Does this mean she can't use her kekkeigenkai at all, ever?_ "In addition, it has grown stronger, but… collapsed in the process."

"What?" Kame couldn't help but blurt out a confused question, distracted as he was by the huge revelations coming to light.

"In consuming more chakra, it seems to have reached some sort of requisite level of chakra and collapsed inwards. It doesn't even _have_ chakra anymore. All that's left is a hungering void that seems to have regressed into a somehow even more mindless state. Any tiny sliver of hope you might have had for mentally forcing it into submission is gone- at this point, it's more like a force of nature than a sentient being." Orochimaru spoke as though he was bitter about something.

However, Haku's reply was actually _happy_. "Does that mean it won't speak to me anymore?"

"Yes," Orochimaru sighed. "However, with that particular loss, I'm left with only one option." He turned towards the wall. "Grandmother, escort Hiretsuna into this room."

Kame was incredibly curious about what this turn of events could be, but did his best to sit patiently and wait. Orochimaru opened a shelf on the wall and removed several large scrolls, as well as a huge piece of paper with an unfinished seal on it that Kame recognized as an incomplete paperbomb. Then he laid down the scrolls, one after another, until the whole table was covered in flat paper and seals that Kame wasn't advanced enough to understand. Even more curiously, the Sannin then ran through a quick set of handsigns and covered the table in an illusion to make it look empty.

He nodded to Kame, speaking again in a much less emotional voice. "Kame, you are to help me with this process. Haku, leave the room." Haku did as he asked, shooting a quick worried glance towards Kame before disappearing out into the hallway. "With attempts at capture of both the eighttails and the fourtails ending in failure, as well as the tentails ceasing to be an option, I'm left with little choice but to use the last remaining tailed beast accessible to me."

"Use… for what?" Kame wasn't sure what the Otokage's objectives here were- _Then again_ , he thought cynically, _do I ever really know what his plans are?_

Ironically, for once Orochimaru stated his ideas plainly: "I am creating a weapon strong enough to annihilate an entire village, and for that I need the chakra of a tailed beast."

"What… what village…" Kame trailed off, restraining himself from going any further for fear of retaliation. As he'd learned over the past few months (under threat of pain for Haku) Orochimaru was very unpredictable when it came to what sort of questions would set him off. A seemingly benign query about the Tanikage had drawn out a huge amount of anger, while at other times a thousand far more controversial conversations had gone by without incident.

Thankfully, Orochimaru didn't seem to take any offense at the question, although he did look distracted, staring off into the middle distance. Even his voice was only half-there. "Vengeance."

"Against-" Kame decided not to push his luck any further and sat back into his chair.

"The Tanikage." Orochimaru finally returned to a lucid state, straightening up and placing the larger piece of paper on the disguised table. "You should know who our ultimate target is, although I warn you that pushing this issue any further will not end well." Kame gave his best submissive nod. "What you need to know at the moment is this: your upcoming missions will all in some way or another contribute to the end goal of killing the Tanikage.

"I've studied and even watched him fight extensively, and from what I've seen he hasn't ever reached a limit of any kind. However, the 'no-limits' line of thinking is a logical fallacy, and while I can assume that he has a good buffer of power that he has yet to use, I also know that he must have a limit." _Even though I saw him beat Haku in one hit, I didn't realize that he was powerful enough to frighten Orochimaru_ , Kame thought. "He has defeated several tailed beasts with seeming ease, but never sealed them- instead, he actually kills any of them unlucky enough to spawn within his borders."

 _Killing a tailed beast…_ Although Kame knew the feat to be possible, he was still awed by the idea- _the tailed beasts brought about peace from being housed in jinchuriki. If something that strong, strong enough to prevent any attacks just by existing in a village, could be killed 'easily'..._ Orochimaru wasn't finished, moving into full-on monologue territory: "However, when the Akatsuki arrived in force, he submitted to allow a base to be built in his lands. If he was afraid of being defeated by _them_ , then it follows reason that an equally powerful team of missing-ninja could be enough to simply overwhelm him."

Kame blinked twice and then realized what his superior meant by that particular statement. "Wait, what? You want to put _us_ up against the Tanikage!?"

Orochimaru narrowed his eyes and Kame balked, remembering his place, as the Sannin carried on in his explanation. "I originally planned for you and Haku to divert his subordinates, but as information on his powers that I will inform you of later has come to light, our time is quickly running out. The second plan was to simply use Haku," Kame flinched and once again had to force himself not to burst out with accusations as he realized that Haku might have died. "-But that was ruled out when the tentails fragment within her evolved into an unusable abomination.

"Therefore, Hiretsuna's sixtails is all that's left for me to use. With his loss, I will need you and Haku both to contribute to the battle against the Tanikage." His tone made it very clear that there would be no debate or discussion of Kame and Haku's roles in the battle. "And that brings us to the matter at hand- the extraction of the sixtails and conversion of it into a weapon. Using a combination of a Four Symbols Seal and basic paperbomb creation, I've created a bomb that will instantly destroy the sixtails and use every last bit of its chakra to create an explosion far beyond anything Deidara could-" he stopped himself briefly.

Kame glanced back towards the huge paperbomb and swallowed. Having made countless paperbombs himself, he understood the reasoning behind them through and through: putting a small amount of chakra into a seal on a piece of paper, which one then keyed to detonate under specific circumstances and convert the entirety of the stored chakra into kinetic heat and energy. The real strong suit of paperbombs was twofold: Firstly, from a pure chakra-for-damage standpoint, they were by far the most efficient method of fighting besides taijutsu. Secondly, they could be made and kept in storage, allowing a person to use them and also save their chakra for more techniques during a fight.

He'd actually thought about using high amounts of chakra in the paperbombs but had quickly dismissed the idea. Doing that would reduce quantity and efficiency, two of their biggest selling points, without granting enough actual power to be really worth it. The basic paperbomb seal wasn't made to accommodate that kind of power, so it would require Kame to develop an entirely new- _wait, that actually sound pretty fun_. He resolved to go pursue that theory later, but at the moment Orochimaru's voice snatched his attention.

"You have an affinity for paperbombs and a basic understanding of sealing. Therefore, you are going to support me in the completion of this ritual. When prompted, you need to follow these orders explicitly and immediately." Kame gave another submissive nod. "I will bind Hiretsuna to this table and extract the chakra of the sixtails from within him, directing it towards the bomb. You will need to activate your cursemark and force it actually into the bomb, then hold it there until I can come and finish the seal."

Again, there was no chance for argument, he simply laid the large sheet of paper down at the side of the table and nodded towards it. Kame stood and moved next to it even as a thought occurred to him: _Hiretsuna's about to die_. He anxiously searched his thoughts, trying to discern what his true feelings about it were, but found absolutely nothing. _I'm not sad, but I'm also not happy, at all, even though I know he's a scumbag… there's just nothing there._ He realized that months of worry about Haku had dulled his empathy for other people, but before he could start to think about what that meant, Hiretsuna stomped through the doorway.

"What's the deal, Orochimaru?" His eyes flickered over to Kame and then to the table. "Why's the little suck-up here?"

"I'm inspecting your seal, so lie down on the table. Kame is here because I'm training him in seal repair as preparation for the future in case Haku loses control at an inopportune moment."

Hiretsuna seemed to buy that explanation and lumbered over, rolling himself up onto the table and lying down. The moment he did so, Orochimaru said, "Bind." Black sealing marks emerged from the table and bound Hiretsuna completely before the man could even react, followed by larger and thicker ones that snaked their way across his body. A series of incredibly loud oaths left his mouth until they were stifled off by another thick line of runes. In mere seconds, the sixtails jinchuriki's bulk was almost completely covered in a forest of black lines and words.

Kame swallowed nervously as Orochimaru spoke again, now deadly serious. "Kame, we're beginning." He reached two pale hands forward over Hiretsuna's stomach and the binding seal parted, as did his clothes, leaving a stretch of distended skin empty for mere moments until another seal faded into existence. At Orochimaru's touch, the seal began to glow, and Kame's stage one senses picked up the bright flare of burning green chakra seeping out faster and faster. As the flow began really moving, he activated his second stage and did his best to create a sort of funnel for the incoming chakra, guiding it down into the paper.

 _This is a lot more difficult than doing it with my own chakra_ , Kame thought, but persevered anyway. When the sixtails' chakra really came out in force, he staggered a little bit and his breath went ragged from effort- trying to restrain and guide the tidal wave of chakra using his own meager reserves was like trying to guide a raging river with his bare hands. Somehow, though, he managed it, mostly due to the seal that Orochimaru had drawn on the paperbomb drawing in the chakra almost magnetically.

All Kame had to do was to siphon it over to within a foot or so of the paper- which, again, was a _lot_ easier said than done. As the chakra flow peaked, he almost lost control over it and as it began to spread he was forced to use sheer willpower to yank it back on course. Luckily, from that point on, the chakra flow eased up bit by bit until the last vestiges of energy swirled down into the seal. Kame created a wall of his chakra over the round, unfinished seal, keeping the now-roiling and unstable sixtails' power at bay until Orochimaru spun around and slammed his open palms down onto the paper. The bright, sickly green light was muffled more and more until it became murky and shimmering, almost like it was underwater.

Kame sagged back against the wall, dimly conscious of both stage one and stage two fading away and leaving him thoroughly exhausted. _Holy crap_ , he thought, _I read about Kage singlehandedly sealing entire tailed beasts, but I could barely control the suppressed chakra of one of them for three feet_. He straightened up as Orochimaru spoke approvingly: "That's finished, then. In the coming weeks, we need to solidify ourselves and gather as much strength as possible. You in particular have proven to be a huge vulnerability in recent missions, so rectify that as quickly as possible if you hope to survive any longer. Seikaku won't always be there to rescue you."

Kame winced at the specific naming of the woman who'd bailed him out several times in the last few months and bowed his head as Orochimaru left the room. When he looked up, he flinched at a terrible sight- Hiretsuna's corpse, melting slowly into white slime, the acid that had run through his veins now eating him from the inside out. He spared one last glance for the disgusting man, trying once more to find some sort of gratification or vengeance, but in the end he couldn't conjure up anything more than apathy. _What does that say about me, then, if I don't hate him? He murdered, raped, tortured… and he enjoyed it. Why can't I hate him!?_

Eventually he found his way up to his and Haku's room, walking in to the objectively creepy sight of her lying in her bed but smiling up at the ceiling. He furrowed his brow in mild confusion, half-stepped towards her, then decided against it and moved over to his cabinet. After ducking into the bathroom to change into pajamas, he dropped himself down onto his bed, too tired to even try to pull out a book. His ennui was eventually shattered by Haku's voice asking a strange question.

"Kame, what are your parents like?" Then she flinched a little bit and tried to backtrack- "No, wait, I'm sorry. You just had to leave them because-"

"No." In all honesty, Kame was glad that she'd given him something to think about besides the gradual decay of his moral compass. Chakra-exhausted as he was, it was difficult to shake himself out of his depressed state, but the odd combination of surface-level innocence with underlying disturbingness did the job. "Don't apologize. I…" He trailed off, remembering all the people he'd left behind. _Mom, Dad… Deihaka, Kankuro, Shira, Gaara… Miriki. He never lost faith in us, even when everyone else says that we're evil. If I keep on doing these things, then I'm proving them all right._ "I think I needed a reminder-"

The door was then knocked open by Himei, looking about as tired as usual. He put an arm up against the doorway and leaned on it heavily, glancing back and forth between the two pajama-clad genin before sighing and speaking in a lazy drawl. "Hey, you two, I just… wanted to ask if you guys are feeling okay."

 _What?_ Kame didn't respond but Haku seemed to be less surprised by the odd display, pausing only briefly before responding. "I think I am, but Kame…" she glanced over at him briefly before continuing back towards the middle-aged Sound-ninja. "Uhm… what about you, Himei?"

He grunted in acknowledgement, then quieted for a few long seconds before finally responding with a slightly-more-heartfelt tone. "I'm fine, but you two… I mean, I heard about what happened on that last mission…"

"I'm okay." Kame tried to smile, but it felt forced. "Business as usual, right?"

"But it shouldn't be!" Himei actually got a little bit energized, but quickly fell back into his usual slump. "It shouldn't be. You two are just kids, you shouldn't be _used_ to this crap." _Why is he coming here and telling us this?_ "I just… I don't know, I feel like I should…"

"You must be a good dad." Haku smiled at him, and Kame realized what she had- _He's feeling guilt over his family_. For the first time in a while, he wished for Miriki's skill at reading and understanding people. _What do I say to him?_

"I… uh… thanks." Himei scratched the back of his neck. "I think… I guess I'm really here to see how you guys are feeling because… Hiretsuna's dead." He said it bluntly, in the same sort of confused tone that Kame had been thinking to himself in for the last few hours. "And as much of a piece of shit as he was, I still… he's a person, that you knew, and he's dead."

Haku smiled sadly. "I knew a girl back before all this, and she's dead." _Sagino_. "She deserved to be alive a lot more than he did, but I messed up and she paid for it-" Her voice choked off a little bit, but Kame was too intimidated by the emotions in the room to make any attempt at dealing with them. "Of all the people I lost, I think that Hiretsuna is… he's the one I'll mourn the least."

Kame finally found his voice. "He was a crappy person and his death wasn't mine or Haku's fault."

Himei grunted again, leaning back towards the hallway. "Alright, I get the message, you two aren't innocent little kids. I guess if these damn missions didn't take your childhood away, Hiretsuna sure did." The mention of that specific aspect of the dead man brought to Kame's mind memories of all the times that the lecherous asshole had made (often-drunken) passes at Haku, and he changed his mind: _I think I really am glad he's gone_. Himei turned away, but left a few final words before disappearing into the passage: "Don't let us take away any more."

The silence after his exit was eventually broken by Kame, now a little bit more sure in himself. "Haku, before he came in, you asked me about my parents." She reddened slightly and opened her mouth to interject, but Kame powered through it. "I think I should… well, I don't really know what to say. I grew up until I was eleven with them, and they were just normal-" _No_ , he realized, _she doesn't really have a good way to judge normal. Wait- neither do I_. He realized with no small amount of surprise that he'd never actually been inside Tetsute or Rakuyo's houses. "I guess normal isn't the right word. I felt like they were… I mean, I think every kid thinks this, but they were just how parents _should_ be."

Haku shook her head helplessly and Kame bit his lip at the second failure to avoid alienating her. "I guess I just want to know… what did your parents do? With you, when you were younger?"

Kame really considered the question before answering. "I trained all the time, because that was the way that my clan was. Mom and dad both spent a lot of time teaching me when I was younger, but after that their job changed and they had to leave me at home alone a lot." He winced at how that sounded and tried to defend and backtrack simultaneously: "I mean, that's not really fair, I'm not saying that they stopped- ugh. I think my real point is that they're probably… Look, they're great, and even though they might not be around for most of the time, that doesn't mean that they don't-"

He stopped talking as Haku failed to suppress a slowly-spreading smile before replying, "It's okay, you don't have to defend your parents from me." The smile faded a little bit as she leaned back against her bed's headboard, looking away from Kame and towards the far wall. "I want to think that that training was their way of loving you… right?"

He started to respond immediately, but slowed himself and took a look at what she was really asking. _The only time she ever talked about what happened with her family, she said that they were training her. Maybe this is her way of_ \- "Yeah, I think so."

Haku nodded and lapsed back into silence, but Kame desperately searched his mind for something, _anything_ to say- However, what he came up with in the end was perhaps better left unsaid. "So, the voice in your head, is it really gone?" He winced as Haku turned towards him, expression unreadable, and started thinking of ways to play it off as a joke, but she replied before he could come up with any.

"Yeah. I don't… it was getting worse, bit by bit, but now I can't hear anything. I don't know if it's better now, that I have to watch myself and never use something I was just starting to get used to, but at least there's some good, right?"

Kame decided to take her newfound optimism as a good sign and would have let the conversation end right then and there, but one final thing nagging at him refused to let up. _I have to be honest with her_ , he thought, as he opened his mouth to confess: "Haku, I'm sorry."

"Wha-"

"I'm sorry that… I can't just ignore this anymore, alright?" He resolved to get it off his chest then and there, and now it was too late to stop. "Back at the academy, when Tetsute and Rakuyo were picking on you, I knew about it. I didn't… I don't think I ever actually did anything, but I knew they were doing it and never even thought to stop them." Kame looked away towards the wall, unable to meet her eyes. "I'm sorry that I let you get hurt, I'm sorry that I took so long to start helping you, and…"

After long seconds of silence, he finally gathered enough courage to turn and look at her, only to see her already facing him with a sad smile. "I knew, and I forgive you." However, despite the upwards curve of her mouth that seemed happy, he could see the underlying sorrow in her eyes. Long after the lights went out, he lay awake in bed, lost in thoughts that all boiled down to one real question: _Am I a good person?_


	35. Arc 4 Vol 3: Changing Relationships

**Ninja Profile: Shibuki**

Ninjutsu: A  
Genjutsu: B  
Taijutsu: A  
Specialties: Explosive Blade, Durability, Swordsmanship

Description: Shibuki's round white mask is emblazoned with orange flames, similar to his wild orange hair exploding out from behind it. He is a huge man, nearly seven feet of muscle, perpetually wearing thick plate armor. In general, he seems to be energetic and happy, although he can go from laughing to serious in a heartbeat when the situation calls for it.

Shibuki wasn't born into a ninja family, instead actually the child of a clan of woodsmen living on one of the islands in the Land of Water. However, with the family perpetually being at the mercy of any ninja who moved through the area, he quickly grew tired of the subservience and left alone for the Hidden Mist village. Upon arrival, he enlisted in the academy and through a paradoxical combination of good-naturedness in person and brutality in combat, ascended to be one of the best Fire style users in the village. When the Seven Ninja Swordsmen were reformed, he was chosen as the wielder of the Explosive Blade due to his ability to get along with nearly anyone as well as his love for explosions.

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"Bad." Kumoningyo chittered, tapping her leg on the webbing in a gesture of her annoyance. Kame winced and did his best to move the puppet back onto solid ground, which was difficult given how he'd misplaced a leg and now it was dangling off over the void. "Kame must take in every detail of his surroundings. If he cannot move his puppet over the webbing alone, how can he hope to manage it during a battle, hmmm?"

Kame set his mouth in a hard line, giving up and yanking the puppet up and back onto the island using brute force, only to be met with another round of clattering mandibles. "Bad! No shortcuts!"

"But-" He started to talk back, but immediately silenced himself and looked down.

"No, if Kame has an objection, he should say it out loud." He slowly turned to look at Kumoningyo, taking in the small-bodied member of the Watchers, green-and-yellow legs starting to turn into a sickly mixture of the two colors from age.

 _Same with her mind_ , he thought uncharitably, before regretting it almost immediately. _No, that's not fair, she's training me in puppetry_. When the spiders had told him that one of the Watchers had agreed to tutor him, he'd been overjoyed to finally continue working on puppet jutsu. However, he hadn't counted on the new teacher being even more strict and insane than Kankuro. She addressed him in the third person, constantly said 'bad' whenever he did anything wrong, and even refused to let him lift the puppet around. "I'm sorry, Kumoningyo, but it's just… why can't I lift the puppet around?"

"Bad." Kame twitched in annoyance but restrained himself from snapping. _It's funny how one word can get to be so annoying_ , he thought. "If Kame leans on a crutch that uses more chakra, how can he hope to improve?"

"The Hidden Sand puppet masters lifted their puppets," Kame said, coming off a little bit more petulantly than he intended to.

"Hidden Sand puppet masters were crude fakes of the spider puppeteers."

"I…" Kame swallowed his pride and dropped his head. "Fine, I'll do it your way." He experimentally moved the strings to make the puppet walk around, which was significantly more difficult than using Wasp in combat. Having to manage the eight-legged spider puppet, moving all of the limbs at once and avoiding tangling them all up, was mentally taxing to say the least. On top of that, Kumoningyo was asking him to walk it across the webbing, on which one misstep would lead to failure.

Kame tried to establish a pattern of some sort, moving the legs in pairs on their sides, but with the asymmetrical web that idea was quickly dropped. Gritting his teeth, he just did it the old-fashioned way and slowly, carefully traversed the webbing with one step after the other. It worked at first, but then it almost fell when one of the back legs slipped off of the webbing. _When I focus on the legs that are moving_ , Kame thought, _the back ones slip off of the webs, but if I focus on keeping them in place the front legs miss the webs entirely_.

"Bad." Kame flinched as Kumoningyo's grating voice came from behind him. "Kame must move the puppet, not just stand it still."

 _I'm getting to that, you piece of-_ Kame calmed himself with a few deep breaths, then tried to move the puppet and found that he couldn't. _What?_ The legs moved only slightly, and soon he realized why; in his rage at being chastised, he'd reactively sent out a burst of chakra into the spider and even now was using more chakra than he should, which was coming out around the legs and activating the webbing. _So, that means I can activate the stickiness of the webbing through the puppet…_

Now armed with this newfound knowledge, Kame re-engaged in his task with far more purpose. It was a lot more simple now- move a leg onto its new spot, send chakra running through it, and then leave it while moving the next leg. He made short work of the twenty meter gap, eating up the distance with ease and then turning triumphantly toward his teacher: "I did it, Kumoningyo!"

"Hmm…" Kumoningyo was still and silent for a few seconds, then continued in a slightly approving tone: "Kame did it. Now, he will do it again."

"What!?" Kame shook his head. "But I already showed that I can do it."

"Kame _will_ move the spider across the web until he shows he can do it without cheating and using the web." Kumoningyo's voice lost the positivity in an instant, snapping straight back into a infuriating whine. "And then, he will do it again and again until he can do it as easily as he breathes."

 _It's not cheating! I'm just using the environment to my advantage!_ Kame opened his mouth to protest, but stopped before actually saying anything, turning back towards the web and resuming his efforts. This time, he moved it straight across the web without stopping, using the stickiness to traverse the gap without any difficulty whatsoever. A small smile made it onto his face before-

"Bad!" Kumoningyo actually tapped him on the side with one of her legs. "Kame is not to use the webs! There is no easy way out like that in the human world!"

Kame narrowed his eyes. "But in the human world, I can just lift the puppet and move it around!"

"Kame is missing the point!" Kumoningyo reared up and one of its legs jackhammered against the ground in irritation. "If he cannot walk the puppet, he cannot manage other things!"

 _I want Kankuro back_. Kame moved back to the edge of the web and started to move the spider once more, this time not attaching it to the webbing. Each step had to be deathly careful, as hitting the round surface of the white lines directly was the only way to avoid glancing off. Not only that, but then he'd have to focus in and keep it there, even as he maneuvered the other legs around to their own positions.

Two meters out from the edge of the land, he missed a step and had to desperately balance on the other seven legs while he hauled the errant one out from the webbing gap, but his concentration was interrupted by a loud snap from behind him: "Bad! Kame must be more careful!"

 _That's the last goddamn straw_. Kame used the threads to lift the spider back onto the web easily, ignoring the angry chitter from behind him, then went back to attaching the legs with his chakra. _I don't even care about the consequences, I don't respect this cantankerous old spider enough to do her stupid exercises_. He marched the spider back onto the mainland, then stood up and turned around toward Kumoningyo with a defiant expression.

"Bad, bad, bad, bad." Kumoningyo spun around and skittered off. "Kame can come back for lessons when he isn't acting like a child."

 _Good riddance_ , Kame thought, crossing his arms and stalking off towards the Weaver layer. _I suppose that's the end of that. Hell, I don't need that training, I'll teach myself_. As much as he tried to tell himself that, though, the memory of his profession to Kankuro kept niggling at him. _I need a teacher, I can't just teach myself, but… I can't just blindly listen to someone who's so… so… ugh_. Her mannerisms, her speech patterns, her attitude, _everything_ about Kumoningyo annoyed him. _I'll find someone else_.

Moving up to the Tricksters' layer, he shoved his hands into the pockets of his pants and shed some of his anger. He followed one of the larger, street-like lines between the confusing personal webs of the spiders themselves (which he'd since learned were equivalent to homes and _highly_ disrespectful to trespass in). Eventually, he saw a larger web with many smaller forms moving around on it, seemingly having multiple layers, so he approached it confusedly.

Upon getting closer, he noticed that the webs weren't specific to any specific type of spider; they were a combined patchwork of many different styles of webbing. The same was true of their occupants; a variety of the different spider classes were scattered all about the various webs, grouped up to a degree that Kame hadn't seen before in the Abyss. His general confusion about what the hell was going on was finally answered by one final detail coming to light: the spiders were almost all tiny, one-to-two feet wide.

 _It's a school!_ Kame stopped at the edge of the web and noticed a small motion above him, so when Kumohiro swung down into his face, already shouting, he remained calm. "Hey, Kame! What's up?"

"Uh…" Kame blanked out on how to respond.

"C'mon, partner, don't-"

"Partner!?" That was enough to elicit a serious response from Kame. _Partner!? I'm the one in charge of him! He's a little kid, not my damn partner_.

"Yeah, partner!" Hiro's tone changed a little bit as he dropped down onto the webbing in front of Kame. A small cohort of other smaller spiders approached gradually, composed of a few Weaver, Combat, and Trickster class spiderlings. "I was just telling my buddies about how you summoned me the other day." Another spider came from behind the kids, a larger brown Weaver that was probably a teacher of some sort. "You remember? When we beat an army of fifty other ninja?"

Kame had summoned Hiro all of twelve times. Seven of those were as a guard whose only job was to disappear, four of them had been to scout out a room and again disappear at the first sign of danger, and the final one had been to scare off some human children to clear the way for a mission without killing them. "No, I…" Kame trailed off, noticing the way that the other kid spiders were silent and glancing back and forth between him and Hiro, and also identified the slight pleading element in Hiro's tone. _He needs the approval of these other kids, doesn't he?_

"It was actually sixty-three enemy ninja, not fifty," Kame grinned. "They were all pretty strong, but against us they had absolutely no chance."

Hiro jumped around to face the group of spiders. "That's right! I told you guys that Kame was a good summoner!" Little exclamations of 'wow' and 'so cool' swelled through the group of schoolchildren, followed by Hiro expanding even further on his exclamation. "Sixty… however many ninja was an easy fight! The real challenge was when we fought the king of the toads!"

 _What?_ Kame kept his face calm but inside he was a little confused by the specific naming of toads. _Is there bad blood between the races?_ "Yeah, Gamabunta was a tough fight, but-"

"Gamabunta was huuuge!" Hiro waved two front legs as far apart as he could. "He was as big as a mountain, and he spat enough water at us to make a huge lake!"

"…Yeah?" Kame gathered himself and did his best to keep supporting Hiro's claims. "He had a huge sword, and a single attack from it cut the tops off of half the forest's trees." The spiderlings all quieted down, so he continued more confidently. "One jump could take him across five kilometers, and his tongue moved faster than the eye could see."

"And how did you beat this 'Gamabunta' fellow?" The kind, authoritative voice of the teacher spider in back held just a hint of humor.

"Well, he might have been big, and fast, and strong, but he wasn't very smart." Kame obeyed his urge to kneel down, smiling at the gathered spiderlings and feeling oddly parent-like. "I kept making illusions and clones, and he kept falling for them. Every time he jumped," he waved a hand in an arc over his head, "and attacked," he slammed the hand into the palm of his other hand, "he got more and more tired."

Hiro took his cue to join back in: "He got slower and slower until he finally… died!"

Small noises of confusion from the spiderlings made Kame want to explain the statement from his small friend. "You see, he was so big and so strong, that when he first showed up and Hiro bit him, he didn't even notice. For the whole fight, he worked harder and harder, which made the poison more and more effective, until he finally died from a tiny little spider bite!"

That ending was apparently a lot more satisfying, as all the little spiders all chittered in what Kame hoped was happiness. Hiro gave a grateful glance back towards Kame, before the elder spider spoke up: "Go on, kids, eat some lunch before class starts again."

At the mention of food, every single one of them tore off back towards the larger groups of spiders, leaving Kame and the elder spider alone on the web. Kame felt oddly euphoric, way happier than he'd been mere minutes ago, but he wasn't sure why. _Is it because I helped out Hiro? No; that's not it, I help people all the time and I don't get like this. Why-_

"That was a nice thing for you to do." The teacher spoke again, in the tone of a proud parent.

"Thanks." Kame felt the blood rush to his face for some reason.

"It's good to see that you could reach Hiro," the teacher continued happily. "I never liked to see him unhappy, but he was always making trouble and it was obviously because he felt alone. Ever since he started talking about how you picked him for summoning, he's been making friends, paying attention in class, and just…" she trailed off. "Look, I think that you're a good person, and Kumogado seems to think you're wise. I'm not a full-time teacher here, just a nurse, but if you ever want to summon me…"

Kame nodded, doing his best to remain serious despite the smile threatening to sully the moment. _A nurse… I might be able to heal Haku if she gets hurt, now._ "I'd like that a lot," he said, reaching forward to touch her offered leg. Upon contact, they did indeed have enough mutual respect to form the summoner's bond and he felt the inviting, considerate warmth of her chakra signature run through his hand, writing it to memory. _That's three_ , he thought.

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"You're incredibly presumptuous to ask that of me," Orochimaru hissed. "Why would I give you access to my findings on Sasori?"

Kame swallowed. "Because you want us to succeed in our attack against the Tanikage, and giving me access to stronger weapons would increase our chances of winning?"

As long seconds passed without a change in Orochimaru's expression, Kame grew more and more nervous, until the Sannin finally sighed and sat back in his throne. "Very well, I'll allow you to look through them. However, before you attempt _anything_ new using the information you find, you will inform me first." Kame nodded profusely. "I'll have Grandmother deliver the information to your room."

As Kame backed away, beginning to think that maybe that he'd get out of the situation without any negative consequences, his hopes were dashed by Orochimaru's voice coming once more: "In the coming week, you and Haku will be engaging in diplomatic missions for me. The other minor villages' Kage need to be informed of the coming attack and given one last attempt to join us."

 _But they're-_ Kame winced a little bit as he thought of the five Kage he'd met. _The Takikage was a crazed lunatic, the Amekage sounded like a robot, the Hoshikage was outright hostile, and the Jettokage… he didn't do or say anything at all_. "Why… why me?"

"After seven months, you're _still_ questioning my orders?" _Oh no_ , Kame thought, but no further retribution seemed to be coming, so he cautiously looked up to see Orochimaru smirking rather than glaring. "You and Haku will be diplomatic emissaries for the Hidden Sound village, and as my weakest two shinobi, you are the most likely to be allowed audiences. Furthermore, if the unpredictable idiots decide to kill you, you two are the ones I can most afford to lose."

"Hey-" Kame bursted out impulsively before covering his mouth in horror, but the damage was done.

"Or, I could kill the both of you right now." Orochimaru waved towards the door. "Never forget the position you're in."

Kame began to walk away, thankful that he'd been spared for his breaking of composure, but one more suicidal thought went through his mind and to his lips before he could stop it: "Why do you want to kill the Tanikage to badly?"

Orochimaru went from vaguely amused to glowering in milliseconds, and Kame felt his cursemark start to twinge. "You really are voracious for information, aren't you?" Kame didn't dare respond. "I suppose you share my curiosity, and I won't fault you for that." _Wait, so he's not going to_ \- "The Tanikage is a danger to me and to any future endeavors that I want to undertake."

Although the Sannin's tone indicated that he was done speaking, Kame's mind was analyzing his words at a thousand kilometers per hour. _Future endeavors… but right now, he's experimenting on humans and running a vast underground network of missing-ninja, so he's not talking about that. If 'endeavors' doesn't mean his normal actions, then what's he referring to?_ The combination of 'not normal' and 'Orochimaru' brought one specific period to Kame's mind that he asked about immediately, now reckless in his quest for answers: "Did the Tanikage destroy the Hidden Sound?"

Orochimaru let out a long, tired breath before responding, "Yes."

"But then… are you doing this for revenge?" Kame's image of Orochimaru began to shift away from what in all honesty truly was, an insane missing-ninja with a god complex, to a more humanized person who simply wanted vengeance for his lost friends.

His response was completely irrelevant to Kame's question. "Mitsuki… he…"

"Orochimaru, are you actually a good-" Kame dropped to his knees and shut his mouth as terrible pain ripped through his cursemark, barely rolling out of the way to dodge an attack from a snake that extended out of Orochimaru's sleeve. He could barely think through the overpowering screaming of every nerve in his body, tears falling freely from his eyes as he curled up into a ball. _If I… any more… I'll go insane_.

He heard but didn't completely register Orochimaru's voice cutting through the haze of pain: "You shouldn't _ever_ think that you're close enough to me to make stupid presumptions about my 'feelings'. Any fantasy you have of me being good is just that; a fantasy, and any more idiotic theories you concoct serve no purpose but to support your pipe dream. I am not your friend, I am not your parent, and I am most definitely not 'good', and neither are you. Drop the delusion of holding on to your morals and accept your reality, Kame."

Whether the Sannin left after that or didn't, Kame didn't know, but the pain dropped enough to allow him to rise to his feet and shakily move towards his room. The long walk over was quiet and left him alone with his thoughts, somewhere he never wanted to be. _He's right, I am deluded. I was going to let children die. I watched Hiretsuna do horrible things without stopping him and lied to myself, thinking that it was just because he was too strong, but… he died and I didn't care._

 _I care about Haku, but…_ he took a step back and examined the events since he'd first laid eyes on her. _Maybe I didn't really realize that it was a genjutsu that first put me there, because there's no way that I… I abandoned everything, my own ideals, my village, my family and friends, for one person. I hung out with Tetsute and Rakuyo for years, but one glance at Haku and I ditched them!?_

 _But it's too late now_ , he thought bitterly. _Because of a damn genjutsu from Miriki's brother, I followed her into the darkness. Now I'm an enemy of the shinobi world and my only allies are Haku and… no, Orochimaru doesn't even count as an ally. Why did I have to be the one to get caught up in the Kosuki family feud?_ Irrational frustration with Miriki flooded his mind, for letting this happen to him. _Where does my life lead now? If I keep trying to be good, Orochimaru's going to keep hurting me. I guess… my only option is to accept this path that I'm on._

With that harrowing thought in his mind, he stepped into his room and saw the crate holding Sasori's secrets. Seeking a distraction, he buried himself in the files and information, surprised at first by the information that Sasori had _been_ a puppet but quickly moving past it to analyze his weaponry. Unfortunately, Orochimaru hadn't had the akatsuki member's most distinctive tools (the Third Kazekage and the 100 Puppets), but several new ones that Kame hadn't ever even heard of were there.

There was also in-depth studying on several weapons Sasori himself had invented, including one idea so cool that Kame even momentarily forgot his regret- In the Sasori puppet, there had been two water cannons powerful enough to cut rock. The way he'd managed that was by using a barrier jutsu to create a perfectly contained one-inch cube, then summoned a lake-size body of water inside of it. With such a massive amount of water being forced to fit into such a tiny space, the resulting pressure caused the water to jet out at ridiculous speeds when even a millimeter-wide hole was opened.

There was more, much more, data and diagrams of flamethrowers, recipes for poisons, and even a look into Sasori's _kekkeigenkai!_ While it was a letdown to find out that one of his kekkeigenkai-less idols had possessed a bloodline trait, nonetheless it was also exciting to learn about it; apparently it allowed Sasori to create puppets out of humans he'd killed and use _their_ kekkeigenkai. Kame's thoughts about that were immediately cut off again when he saw a dusty scroll in the back of the box- _A puppet!?_

Kame remembered his promise to Orochimaru and refrained from attempting to use said puppet, instead finding its relevant files and digging through it. Apparently, that specific one, called 'Emperor', had been left behind on Sasori's final mission because of damage that it had sustained. Further reading made Kame glad that he hadn't tried to summon it, because it was _massive_. Over three meters tall, it was a humanoid but clad in heavy metal armor and wielding a huge bludgeon-like weapon.

The details on it made Kame's eyes widen- the sheer durability and strength of it were unbelievable, not to mention the hidden gas and needle attacks, the flamethrowers… it was an absolute powerhouse. _I'm going to fix this_ , he decided, stowing the scroll back in the crate. With a sudden pang of regret, he saw how heavy it was and realized that the only way he'd ever manage to move it would be by moving its legs- exactly what Kumoningyo had been trying to teach him earlier that morning.

It was then that Haku opened the door and saw him on his bed, surrounded by scrolls. She smiled at him and those doubts he'd had mere minutes ago were banished, even the quiet, complaining voice inside him getting silenced completely. As much as Kame hated his situation and regretted the fact that he'd left all the other people in his life, he'd never be able to hate her. Maybe it was because losing her would make everything else he'd done worthless, maybe it really _was_ just a genjutsu, and maybe it was because he truly had changed as a person, but every time he saw her alive and smiling he knew that he'd done _something_ right.


	36. Arc 4 Vol 4: The Hidden Rain Village

**(A/N) So the villages that the Amekage mentioned having successfully taken over at the minor village summit were the Hidden Grass and Hidden Stone, but when I said Hidden Stone Village I meant the minor one that borders the Land of Wind and attacked it during Gaara Hiden. (Not the Hidden Stone in the land of earth, one of the five great villages). For purposes of simplicity, I'm going to refer to Iwagakure as the Hidden Stone and Ishigakure (the destroyed one) as the Hidden Rock from now on.**

 **Also, the Ninja Profiles/Bingo Book Entries are official records kept by a party independent of but loyal to the five great shinobi villages and are common information that is kept on all ninja genin-rank or higher and distributed freely. Highly sensitive information is sometimes kept from them, but for the most part they represent the legitimate shinobi world's current image of a ninja.**

 **Ninja Profile: The Amekage**

Ninjutsu: ?  
Genjutsu: ?  
Taijutsu: ?  
Specialties: Tactics, Space-Time Ninjutsu, Absolute Leadership

Description: The Amekage stand with unremarkable height or build, but their posture is always one of absolute precision and control. Their face hasn't yet been seen, hidden behind a perfectly carved golden mask, and their voice is a flat and toneless yet equally precise monotone. The gold extends to even the prosthetics that visibly replace their forearms and lower legs, as well as the lining on their clothing.

Origin: The Amekage is a relative unknown in the ninja world, having appeared and come to power about forty years after the Fourth Shinobi World War. Their true identity is a mystery, and the only known information on them is public record: they appeared, led an hour-long revolution, and seized control over the Hidden Rain. After that, they and the entire village dropped off of public view during something referred to as the 'Great Rebuilding', after which they resumed operations in the public eye. However, since the Amekage's rise, the Village Hidden in the Rain has denied any close ties with other villages.

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With bases in every single nation, Orochimaru's domain was huge and near-inescapable. _Although_ , Kame thought uncharitably, _maybe he could've put the bases in slightly-more-relevant areas._ He and Haku had been hiking for hours on end from the base through the incredibly dull and grey countryside, moving directly towards the Hidden Rain, which in and of itself was slightly disturbing to Kame. _Orochimaru did tell us to just go straight there, but… we're missing-ninja, dangerous ones._

The latest bingo book had just come out, to the late Hiretsuna's glee, and Kame had been bumped up to a B-class missing-ninja. That meant chunin and jonin would be sent to deal with him, while Haku's A-rank would bring down jonin and ANBU. Apparently, though, it was fine for two known criminals like them to simply traipse through the Hidden Rain's damp countryside in full view of anyone-

Kame felt himself pale a bit as he realized that, despite having stumbled onto a main road and walked along it for several hours, he had yet to see another human being besides Haku. After some mild chatting, the last hour or so of walking had been in silence that had at first seemed content, but now just felt eerie. He remembered the summit, where the various minor villages' delegates had all been varying types of scary, but the Amekage had stood out most of all. Something in the way that man had spoken, replying almost instantly and never pausing to think or take breath, or his elaborate prosthetic limbs and intricate metal mask, had left a strong and terrifying impression in Kame's mind.

Haku elbowed him and he looked up to see a group of three people standing in the middle of the road, completely still. The two Sound ninja shared a quick glance and then proceeded towards the three forms with extreme care, Kame even drawing and placing a windbomb on his chest in case they needed an escape. Upon nearing the three people, Kame recognized their headbands with the four lines of the Hidden Rain. The figures stood side-by-side with perfectly identical posture, each clad in light grey clothing underneath the dark grey and featureless vests of their village. In addition, they had steel protector guards on their forearms and lower legs and held kunai in their hands, which they raised once Kame and Haku came within a certain distance of them.

"You are the Hidden Sound representatives?" Kame jumped a little bit as none of their faces moved, then he saw- their faces weren't visible. They had metal masks with two round holes where their eyes were and a line in the general area of their mouths. Nothing was visible through the small holes, only a flat darkness. Kame actively flinched backwards, but when he moved in surprise, they instantly reacted by dropping into combat stances and readying to throw their kunai in unison.

"Yes, we are." Haku sounded slightly put off, but managed to smile and maintain composure.

"You will follow us." One of the Rain ninja turned and moved back between the other two, going off down the road. Kame gave Haku another confused glance, but started forward after it. Once he and Haku had moved between the other two guard, they fell into line behind them and formed a rough triangle. _I don't like this_ , thought Kame. _This might be a good way to protect us, but it's also a good way to surround us_.

However, he couldn't pretend that it was _only_ the positioning of the guard that was putting him on edge. Something about the Rain shinobi was just… wrong. The way they moved a little bit too perfectly, the lack of emotion from any of them, and even the land itself all sent Kame's nerves haywire and screaming at him to leave. It took a lot more restraint than he'd like to admit it did to keep himself from trying to escape or enter a defensive stance, but he managed to keep still and quiet as their little group marched down the long road.

Eventually, a haze on the horizon slowly became a visible city, with the grey skies getting darker and darker until they condensed into rainclouds pouring down onto the Hidden Rain itself. A huge lake surrounded the city like a moat, seemingly fueled by the heavy downpour to swell to huge sized. However, massive metal bridges spanned the gap easily, coming in at exactly interspersed angles like the spokes of a wheel all leading directly into the raised city itself.

As they came even closer, Kame noticed the Hidden Rain's stark contrast with the dead-looking area surrounding it. The city itself almost seemed alive, with lights glittering all over the various towers and buildings and smoke pouring out of hundreds of vents. _No, not alive_ , Kame thought, _it's like a machine_. The guards didn't even stop or slow as they stepped up onto the steel bridge, so Kame wasn't given any time to stop or gawk at his surroundings. The lake that now filled both sides of his vision also looked off, with a dark and murky stillness that he hadn't seen anywhere before.

The air went from humid to wet as they entered the rain's domain, but thankfully Grandmother had seen fit to include raincoats in their mission supplies. She'd even color-coded them; Kame's was a dark brown while Haku's was purple. The Rain ninja seemed unaffected by the falling droplets, which at a surface level wasn't particularly surprising, but as the water ran down their masks and dampened the cloth covering their hair without drawing any reaction whatsoever, Kame's mounting dread grew just a little bit more.

Finally, they approached a gate to the city that was manned by another four Rain shinobi whose appearance was again exactly the same as the ones guarding Kame. Unmoving metal masks gave him dead stares, but the gate was opened without any deliberation or talking and Kame was ushered forward without breaking stride.

Upon entering the Hidden Rain itself, Kame staggered back a little bit and coughed from the smokey air, which send a shuddering wave of motion through his vision. Looking back up, he saw that all of the Rain ninja within view had turned to look directly at him, but all looked back to whatever task they were attending to when he hurriedly resumed walking beside Haku. The main street that they strode down was flanked by tightly-packed buildings, all of which looked industrialized far more than the Hidden Sand.

Most imposing were the huge structures that dominated over the surrounding smaller ones, especially the towers. The appearance of motion that Kame had been impressed with was mostly brought about by the huge gears, wheels and belts that emerged from said huge buildings, along with the vents that sent smoke billowing up as if to fight the falling rain. The people of the city were _very_ few and far between, and even then consisted almost completely of the same clones that were escorting him and Haku.

Eventually, Kame ended up walking through a huge doorway and into the tallest tower of the city, up a set of stairs past more Rain ninja standing at attention, and ending up before a new type of person: Wearing the same Rain headband, but with a mask carved out of a much more polished, silvery metal and with more human-like features. A nose, two cold eyes, and a stern mouth were all set into the shiny metal, though none of them moved as the shinobi stood deadly still and stared directly towards Kame.

He noticed a symbol laid in white stitching over the grey cloth of the ninja's vest; the kanji for 'air' with a circle around it. The forearm and leg protectors of the new ninja were also made of the same cleaner metal, but they had lines on the edges colored in the same white. _Is this… a jonin? Wait, no, if the ones guarding me and Haku are genin, then maybe this one is a chunin…_ He was left to wonder as the ninja of indeterminate rank stepped to the side and allowed the group of Sound and Rain ninja past him and up to a new door.

The door opened seemingly on its own and Kame stepped through it to find himself facing the Amekage, who was standing at the other side of the small room with hands clasped behind his back. As Kame felt dread overtake him he stopped walking, only to be grabbed by one of the guards behind him and pushed over to one of two chairs. "Sit," the Amekage said, so Kame complied, watching Haku do the same.

The Amekage was similar and yet vastly different from the other rain shinobi. Now not wearing the traditional Kage robes that he had at the summit, instead he was clad in a grey mesh top and grey chainmail pants, along with a metal breastplate. Rather than dull or shiny steel, his mask and even the lining on his clothing was a polished gold. Intricate carvings on the mask itself aside, it seemed more lifelike than those of the other underlings and morphed into human expressions. The mesh shirt ended at the man's elbows, underneath which were two prosthetic forearms made up complex gears, cables, and levers all of which were visible to the eye and composed of pure gold.

"You were sent to discuss strategy." The Amekage's voice that Kame had identified before as male was less so in person… _this could be a woman_ , he thought.

"Yes." Haku responded for the both of them.

"My directives to him demanded that he send two genin-rank ambassadors." _Damn_ , Kame thought, _it's hard to try to talk with someone who has no inflection in their voice or tone at all. I can't tell if he… she… they are upset, or satisfied_.

"I am genin-rank, and so is Kame." Haku smiled, but quickly dropped back into a more restrained expression as the expression was not reciprocated.

"Our database matched that assessment. However, your accomplishments are not those that a genin-rank ninja could accomplish. The inefficient system of ranking is clearly flawed." Kame wasn't sure how to respond to that, but thankfully the Amekage seemed to move on near-instantly. "But at this point it's irrelevant. Explain your purpose for meeting us here."

' _Us'?_ Kame glanced around the room but didn't see any other ninja whatsoever, during which time Haku again responded for the both of them. "Orochima- er, the Otokage has sent us to try to get your help for our military movements."

"We-" _Again with the plural_ , Kame noted, "-must know more before entering any actual agreement."

This one Kame _could_ answer: "We plan to attack the Hidden Valley village in less than a week's time." Orochimaru had told him that it was okay to disclose as much information about the attack as was necessary. Apparently, the Amekage was reliable insofar as that he would prefer to have the Hidden Sound left alive than the Hidden Valley. "Our goal is to kill the Tanikage."

The Amekage stood dead still for long enough to make Kame start to consider getting up, but finally responded: "What of your forces will participate in attacking?"

"Uh…" Kame thought briefly before replying. "Orochimaru, me, Haku, Himei, Sankuryu, and Seikaku are the ones engaging on the Tanikage, while the Sound will also send a lot more expendable ninja to-"

"What of the jinchuriki known as Hiretsuna?"

"He's…" _I don't think I should tell another Kage about him being dead, but… Orochimaru told me to give them any information they asked for_. "He was killed in the creation of a chakra bomb that we'll use in our attack on the Hidden Valley."

The Amekage paused again, then looked to Haku. "Our scan on you indicated that you possess no tailed beast, so yours must have also been used in the process. What weapon has Orochimaru created with so much chakra?"

Haku replied, "I'm actually still in possession of my tailed beast, although… but nevermind. As for the weapon, well…"

Kame picked up where she trailed off: "Hiretsuna's tailed beast chakra was compressed into an explosive that should be capable of levelling the entire Hidden Valley."

"An interesting tactic, but against the Tanikage…" the Amekage paused before continuing off in a completely new direction: "Such a weapon would lend to your cause, but is far less valuable than the tailed beast. We will consider your request and access our records to determine the probability of success."

With that cryptic statement, the Amekage turned back to the window and the door behind Kame opened, admitting the guards from earlier into the room. As they stood expectantly, Kame got up onto his feet and moved towards the door, assuming that his choice was the correct one when they wordlessly fell into line behind him. He remembered something and turned back towards the Amekage: "Wait, what are we supposed to-"

The door slammed shut behind the two guards and Kame was left with no answers. Haku seemed just as confused as he was and actually turned to him and asked, "So, what now?"

"I don't know… do we go back to the base?"

Kame's question was answered by one of the Rain ninja, which scared the living crap out of him. "You are not to leave the Hidden Rain until a decision has been reached." Kame stiffened too quickly and stumbled backwards, heart pounding loud enough for him to hear and hand twitching towards his kunai. He'd spoken to the person, before, but for some reason miles upon miles of silent walking had lulled him into a false sense of security.

Haku stifled a laugh at his overreaction, then pointed down the hallway: "Can we move around _in_ the Hidden Rain?" When the guards didn't answer, she just started walking, so Kame tagged along behind her. For some reason, along with the dread came a desire to confer with Haku, but with the guards mere feet away he decided now probably wasn't the best time.

Several flights of stairs later, he found himself stopping at the edge of the Amekage's tower, reluctant to go any further. "Haku, are you sure we should-"

"Yeah, I want to see more of this village and get something to eat."

Once again, Kame was startled by the toneless voice trailing out of the Rain shinobi behind him, but this time he kept his surprise under control and instead turned around slowly to face them. "There is only one place for you to eat in this village. Follow us."

Kame did as the guard asked, trailing behind them while rapidly considering the implications of what had just been said. _Only one food shop… but this is a whole village, why would there only be one food shop? Wait, he did say 'for you', so maybe they just don't want us to eat anywhere else?_

The Rain ninja led Kame and Haku through more of the same industrialized metal-and-stone buildings in various shades of grey, eventually taking them to a dimly lit building labeled 'Ichimi Ramen' but stopping at the entrance. Haku walked straight in, ignoring the Rain guards. Kame glanced at them, but they made no move to enter after her, so he shrugged and stepped under the curtain.

The place he found himself in was not at all what he'd expected, warm and brightly lit despite the grey, cold rain just outside. A countertop with five stools and a kitchen across it were the only features, all painted a reddish color that was again at odds with the monotony less than six feet away. Haku had already seated herself, and as Kame slid in next to her, a middle-aged man stepped out from a back room with a wide smile, making some inner part of Kame sigh in relief at the sight of another real human face.

"Hey there, kids, what can I do ya for?" _Even his tone is warm and happy_ , Kame thought before glancing over the man's head to read the menu, finally settling on a dish.

"Can I get an order of miso ramen?"

Haku mirrored his request, and the shopkeeper nodded. "Sure thing, coming right up!"

As he disappeared back into the restaurant, Haku seemed to briefly glance outside before leaning in to speak to Kame in a lower tone. "Something's going on with this city."

"Yeah, but…" Kame shot one more glance towards the still curtains, then voiced his thoughts. "I haven't seen a single civilian, and all the shinobi are way too similar. This guy seems to be the only normal person in this entire village-"

A metal grinding noise from behind him startled him into drawing a kunai and whipping around to the sight of two limp bodies collapsing just outside the curtains. Just as they hit the ground, a newcomer pushed the curtains aside- a boy, who looked about fourteen or fifteen, clad in the Rain vest and grey clothing underneath it but with a joyful face and messy white hair showing. His green eyes sparkled with excitement as he stepped over and proffered an open hand for a handshake, so Kame obliged him, albeit with reservations.

 _Who the hell is this!?_ As the boy dropped into the seat beside Kame, he grinned even wider at the shopkeeper, speaking in an unnecessarily exuberant voice: "Hey gramps! Sorry I'm late!"

"All is forgiven, Kinzoku." The shopkeeper emerged from the kitchen with ramen bowls that he placed down before Kame, Haku, and the newcomer Kinzoku. "Although, I really wish that you wouldn't kill those people just outside my shop."

 _What?_ Kame instinctively glanced back towards the two limp bodies again, now actually scared. _I was technically allied to them, so this person might want to kill me, too…_ but his fears were laid to rest (at least for the moment) by a wide smile and more of the happy talking: "Oops, guess I did it again, gramps… but don't worry, dad can fix them in no time."

 _So he's the son of someone who can heal… no, 'fix' the dead Rain ninja?_ Kame turned back to his food and dug in, trying to bury the creeping discomfort in his gut under the mixing flavors of the ramen. _This is actually pretty good_. A question shot into his mind and after a brief hesitation before he reminded himself that Orochimaru wasn't nearby, he asked it: "Why is this the only restaurant in the Rain?"

The old man's smile faded away slightly, revealing a bitterness underneath. "Ah, when the Great Rebuilding happened, the village lost a need for food, but I was allowed to keep my shop around because Kinzoku here," he reached over the counter to pat the teenager's head, "-asked for it."

"The Great Rebuilding?" Kame asked between mouthfuls of the ramen. He hadn't realized just how hungry he was until the food was presented to him, but now he was tearing through the noodles at a speed he wasn't normally capable of.

"Yeah!" Kinzoku's voice somehow grew even more unwarrantedly delighted. "That's when dad took over the Rain!"

The ramen cook's smile faded even further. "Yes, when the Amekage, first of his title, took power in the Rain, he reshaped the military and even the surrounding country. The people call that event the Great Rebuilding- or, they used to. Now it's just me and Kinzoku."

"So…" Kame glanced again at the fallen ninja outside. "Didn't Kinzoku just kill two Rain shinobi? I thought the Amekage was your father, so why-"

"I told you, stupid, dad can fix them."

"But-" Kame bit his lip, desperate for answers but also overloaded with information.

Thankfully, Haku came to his rescue and spoke when he couldn't: "Why can he 'fix' them? Does he bring people back to life from the dead, or…?"

"I dunno." Kinzoku scratched his head, then leaped to his feet excitedly. "Oh, I know, I'll just show you two! Here, c'mon, come with me!"

He began walking off, leaving Kame to glance at his emptied bowl of ramen and then at the chef before pulling out enough money to pay the tab and moving to follow the childlike son of the Amekage. Haku glanced longingly back at the food, muttered "Aww…" but ended up tagging along with the other two, leaving the saddened shopkeeper by himself.

As they moved through the streets, any Rain shinobi that saw them moved to keep a wide berth while keeping eyes trained on them. Kinzoku led them through dark alleyways and up onto the rooftops, cutting a haphazard route through a variety of obstacles until he arrived at the top of one of the larger buildings. He bent over and then pulled up on a hatch that was clearly locked, but before Kame could point that out he'd already yanked the entire thing, lock and all, out of the roof and tossed it off the edge of the building. Shattered rock fragments ringed a dark hole that Kinzoku unhesitantly jumped down into.

"Should we…?" Kame trailed off questioningly towards Haku, but she was already jumping down into the darkness, leaving him little choice but to leap as well. After what had to be only a few meters, he hit a solid surface that was dimly lit enough by trailing light off to his right. Still in pursuit of Kinzoku, he walked towards the silhouette of the other boy but soon found himself looking down into a massive storehouse packed almost fully with dark forms.

Kame's eyes gradually grew accustomed to the darkness, but once they did, he gasped- all of those forms in the darkness were _humanoid_. He subconscious backed away slowly, mind racing in terror as he imagined just how many corpses were stood-

 _Wait, corpses can't stand_ , Kame thought, approaching again as curiosity overpowered horror. Kinzoku turned towards him, still smiling, and then appeared to realize something and spoke: "Oh, sorry, I forgot that you two can't…" he leaped over to the wall and appeared to rip something off of it before shoving his arm into the hole. A few sparks flew and then Kame flinched backwards as dim lights turned on all over the place, burning his dilated pupils.

Blinking the spots out of his vision, he took a cautious step forward and tried to get a better grasp of his surroundings. He, Haku, and Kinzoku stood on a raised flat platform of concrete that overlooked a massive warehouse. From the ground up, the entire storage facility was occupied by layer after layer, shelf after shelf full of what he'd mistakenly assumed to be corpses but were actually… _Rain shinobi? But… why are they standing still in a dark warehouse?_ He turned to voice the question, but a finger to his lips silenced him.

Kinzoku used his other pointer finger to direct Kame's attention back to the floor of the building. "Look," he whispered, "see?" Two of the forms at the end of the warehouse jerked forward suddenly, assumed a more ready position than the neutral stance that the other shinobi were assuming, and then disappeared in small clouds of summoning smoke. The other still bodies in their row marched two steps forward before dropping back into their neutral stance, filling the gap.

Kinzoku grabbed Kame's shoulder and pulled him back towards the hole in the roof. "You're gonna miss the cool part!" Kame played along, letting the other boy drag him across the concrete surface and past the hole, on for a surprisingly long time, until they reached the far end of the concrete surface and looked down over the edge. To his surprise, the line of inactive ninja was _still_ going, and it was only at the very far side of the massive storehouse that the two gaps left behind by the disappeared Rain ninja were visible.

Two small doors opened, letting out a loud cacophony of noise, and then deposited two new Rain ninja onto the ground, who stood and moved to the gaps in the lines, refilling them and making the warehouse fully occupied once more. _What is this?_ Kame thought, completely speechless at the eerie and unnatural display. _Does he have all the ninja under a genjutsu or something? That would actually explain why they don't need civili-_

Haku spoke. "Kame, behind us."

He turned to see the silvery Rain ninja with the 'Air' symbol on their chest and white patterning, approaching rapidly and barking out orders. "Kinzoku, you are to return to your quarters at once!" The boy nodded sheepishly and darted off past them. "Hidden Sound Ambassadors, you are to report to the Amekage's tower immediately."

Kame swallowed, briefly considering making a break for it before the hordes of unconscious Rain ninja surrounding him made him rethink that decision and simply nod. He and Haku moved towards the hole in the roof, clambered through it, and then made their way over rooftops back to the Amekage's tower. Once inside it, they were directed straight back up into the Amekage's audience chamber, where they were confronted by the same impassive golden face that the Rain's leader had worn when they'd first met.

Once they sat down, the Amekage wasted no time and got straight to the point. "Your request for military support has been considered and rejected."

Kame winced and envisioned how Orochimaru would react to that new, desperately trying to think of a way to avoid such an outcome. "And why is that?" _Maybe if I get a reason, I can argue our case, or at least have an excuse to give Orochimaru…_

"Because after long research on his powers and known battles, we have decided that the Tanikage is an enemy that we are not prepared to face. In addition, to expose ourselves before the full incorporation of the Rock and Grass is not an option at all." The Amekage pointed towards the wall behind Kame. "Return to Orochimaru."

Kame wanted to make one final argument, but before he got the chance the Amekage was already turning away and several more carbon-copy Rain shinobi were stepping forward and directing him and Haku towards the exit. As he left first the Kage's tower and then the Hidden Rain itself, Kame found himself faintly glad that the eerie village hadn't agreed to join them. _Something very wrong is going on there_ , he thought, _but I don't want to know the details._


	37. Arc 4 Vol 5: Diplomacy

**(A/N) So the Land of Bears, which was talked about in one of the Naruto fillers, was never shown on the map itself. In this setting, it's located between the Land of Snow and Land of Lightning.**

 **Ninja Profile: Sutsuhi**

Ninjutsu: S  
Genjutsu: A  
Taijutsu: A  
Specialties: Plasma Release, Accuracy, Power

Description: Sutsuhi is typically clad in the yellow-lined robe of the Hoshikage, although she forgoes the hat in favor of letting her medium-length deep blue hair hang loose. She has golden-yellow eyes that glow slightly, some say as a result of her unusual birth. In person, she is brash and prideful, suffering no slight against her village, and cares very little for decorum or formalities.

Origin: Sutsuhi grew up a child of a traitor to the Hidden Star, conceived long after he'd absorbed the fallen meteorite and lost it all in one night. However, that event had lasting repercussions on her, as it gave her access to the second known Kekkei Tota: Plasma Release, a combination of the fire, wind, and water natures. With her newfound powers, she kept the village relevant among other more successful ones, and when the Hoshikage Sumaru passed away after naming her his successor she ascended to the rank gladly. However, even her unique power could not keep the Hidden Star from falling apart economically during the era of peace and she has grown more and more resentful as the village she loves has fallen apart at the seams.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

As the sun began to fall with the coming of late afternoon, Kame gladly soaked up the heat. In a very strong contrast to the cold, damp, and grey countryside of the Hidden Rain, the Land of Bears was warm, vibrant and alive. The sun was fully out and beating down on him, yet he was happy to be somewhere as hot as the Hidden Sand- the dank lair of Orochimaru and the Hidden Rain were both repellent to someone like Kame who'd been raised in the desert. The trees surrounding the road didn't extend to cover it, which he was just fine with. The Land of Bears was adjacent to the Land of Lightning but far less well-known, smaller and poorer than its cousin.

After arriving at the Land of Bears base, Kame and Haku had donned disguises before finding the road that would take them to their destination. Although he knew that the filmy layer of skin was present over his own face, Kame couldn't feel it at all and rapidly forgot that it was even there, reminded only when he looked at Haku's altered features. They'd also forgone their Hidden Sound headbands in favor of Hidden Valley ones (ironically). The long walk from the base had started with some small talk between him and Haku but had quickly devolved into a rehashing of an old argument: "I can't believe you could even think that Kisame could beat Konan. She'd just turn into paper and keep him at a distance!"

Haku shook her head. "Two problems with that: One, Kisame was able to create a miniature ocean for miles around him, and two, his sword could eat the chakra in her paper. How would she possibly win?"

"Because she could get outside the ocean and wait him out! He can't just hunt down every little scrap of paper, and eventually he'll run out of chakra."

"But you could say the same thing for Kisame!" Haku grinned, evidently enjoying the opportunity to argue in favor of _her_ favorite akatsuki member. "He has a ton of time to just walk around and hunt down her paper, and if she engages fully, _then_ he uses the miniature ocean."

Kame lapsed into silence, desperately searching for a hole in her strategy, but unable to find anything. Given his similarities with Konan and Haku's with Kisame, this argument had been a popular contest, but at the moment he was stumped as to- _No_ , he thought, _I've got it_. "Six hundred billion paperbombs."

"Huh?" Haku seemed genuinely confused by his contextless statement.

"Six hundred billion paperbombs!" Kame grinned as he did some quick mental calculations. "Assuming they're as strong as mine, and mine each cover an area of about sixty square meters, then… Konan could destroy thirty-six trillion square meters, or thirty-six million square kilometers."

Haku opened and closed her mouth without saying anything, just slowly shaking her head. "But… if she could do that, then why didn't she? No, there's no way she could do something like that, where did you you hear-"

"Orochimaru told me." Kame's grin grew even wider as he realized how ironclad his position was. _Hell, with this logic_ , he thought, _I could probably argue Konan winning against anybody_. Realizing that, he thought for a moment before conceding that he should probably change the subject. "Alright, Rock Lee vs Shira."

Haku brightened up and started to say, "Shir-" before quieting and frowning as she evidently considered the point further. "Actually, it's probably a tie."

"Why?" Kame hadn't spent very much time studying basic taijutsu users, mostly because taijutsu was an all-or-nothing path- either you specialized in it, or you were passable at it. Kame had briefly gone through a phase where he thought he'd be a weapon specialist, but due to Rakuyo's superiority in that area and his discovery of paperbombs, he'd dropped the idea. At no point, though, had he put anything besides the basic efforts into improving his hand-to-hand fighting, which left him ill-equipped to think through a battle between two masters of it.

"Because as soon as Shira-sensei or Lee-senpai use the Seventh Breath of Eight Gate, the other one will have to use theirs, and then no matter what happens both of them will die." Haku sounded grim, but that raised another question for Kame.

"Wait, I thought you said that the Seven Breaths didn't hurt your body." Kame tried to keep his tone from being accusatory, but he was frustrated by this revelation: not only did it mean that she'd lied to him before, but it also meant that she'd regularly been subjecting herself to physical harm and he hadn't known about it.

"They don't…" Haku seemed to realize his frustration and started explaining herself. "But I'm not normal, they _do_ hurt Shira-sensei. When he uses the Breaths, it sends a huge amount of chakra moving through his system, more than he can handle, so he gets hurt. But since my chakra couldn't ever leave my system in the first place, and I was using it to improve my taijutsu for years, my system's a lot more used to it, so it just ends up draining a ton of chakra without hurting me."

Kame shook his head slightly, still confused as to how she could handle chakra that intense without suffering some form of harm. Haku looked upwards and considered for another couple seconds before making another attempt: "Okay, so you know how people have to train a lot to use the Breaths? That's because using them puts a huge amount of strain on the body, but training can help you deal with that strain. I was training with moving chakra around in my body since I was little, so I've trained a lot more than anyone else."

"Okay." Kame would have asked more about the Seven Breaths, but it was then that they arrived at a shaky-looking bridge over a huge ravine that Orochimaru had said was filled with poisonous gas. _Are we really going to cross-_ but Haku was already halfway across the bridge, jogging casually without a care in the world. Kame followed along with quite a bit more restraint, eventually reaching the end of the trek and finding himself standing before a set of ancient-looking wooden steps. With the edge of the village in sight, he felt re-energized slightly and sped up, Haku following along behind him, until reaching a large wooden gate with a star painted over it.

Before he could reach it, though, two dark forms darted into the road before him, dressed in purples and greys and wearing headbands inscribed with the star of their village. One of them held up a palm towards them in a clear gesture to stop, speaking in a gruff voice: "You there; stop and identify yourselves."

Thankfully, Kame had been instructed by Orochimaru on how to respond. "Emissaries from the Otokage, sent to discuss strategic operations with the Hoshikage."

The two Star ninja shared a glance at the mention of the criminal Hoshikage, but evidently they'd already received their own orders regarding the situation and stepped aside to allow Kame and Haku through the gate. As Kame walked forward into the Hidden Star village, he was surprised by how _normal_ it looked. The small buildings almost didn't even seem like they housed shinobi, and the village itself was tiny and surrounded by a wooden stockade that wouldn't help at all against a ninja attack.

The second thing Kame noticed was the people- they were all subdued, and while far from the mechanical slaves in the Rain, they spoke very little and mostly just gazed at Kame and Haku silently. The few shops that he could see were near-empty of people, and even the streets were quiet and still. Like the Rain, Kame had a bad feeling in his gut about the inner workings of the Hidden Star, but he didn't have the faintest clue of what it was. After a very short walk, they reached the Hoshikage's building, which (like the rest of the village) was relatively unimpressive and small.

As they neared the small building, one of the guards moved ahead of them and blocked their path with arms crossed. "Only one of you can go in."

Kame wanted to argue, but Haku pushed him forward. "Go ahead, Kame. I'll wait here."

Sparing one glance back at her, he swallowed and stepped past the guard, the other one tagging along behind him. Double doors opened to allow them entry to the structure, which was only two stories. After a very short flight of stairs, Kame found himself moving through another open door and then standing before the Hoshikage. The office was reminiscent of the village in that it was empty-looking, with half-open cabinets lining the walls and a few scrolls and files scattered about. Its only occupant was the Kage herself, lounging in a chair behind her beat-up desk. Her slightly glowing yellow eyes were just as hostile as they'd been at the summit, but her voice was slightly more formal and restrained: "Orochimaru's sent you, has he?"

Kame did his best to respond politely. "Yes, I-"

"And why're you here? What's his game?" At the sensitive question, Kame glanced back towards the two shinobi guards awkwardly. The Hoshikage sighed and waved them off, and after the door closed, Kame turned back and answered.

"Lord Orochimaru will be making an attack upon the Village Hidden in the Valleys in three days' time. Will you-"

The Hoshikage interrupted him again, tossing her deep blue hair away from her face and looking considerate. "Huh, so the snake bastard finally got up the balls to finish him off, then? And now you want me to get _my_ people to help you."

"Yes."

She leaned back and spread her hands helplessly. "I don't see why I should risk what little ninja and resources I have on Orochimaru's personal vendetta."

Kame remembered something else the Sannin had told him: "Lord Orochimaru told me that you'd say that." The Hoshikage's eye twitched in annoyance. "He said to tell you 'You're the next in line.'"

She worked her mouth in annoyance for a few seconds, then shook her head. "Attacking the Tanikage is a fool's game. I don't know what Orochimaru thinks he has up his sleeve, but there's no way that his gang of children stand a chance."

"Why?" Kame hadn't been directed to ask this question, but his personal spirit of inquiry demanded that he do it. "Why is the Tanikage so terrifying? Orochimaru said that he destroyed the Hidden Sound, but-"

"Oh, he didn't tell you the rest?" The Hoshikage's grin returned in force. "The Tanikage destroyed the Hidden Sound, yeah, but he also destroyed the Hidden Snow, the Land of Whirlpools, and Heat Devil Village practically singlehandedly." Kame sucked in a breath- that record spanned more than a century of sporadic tragedies, all of which hadn't been attributed to the man. "Orochimaru's terrified of the guy, and all he can talk about is asking for help in some revenge scheme. Tell him the answer is no, and I don't care-"

She was cut off when a small, angry form launched itself from the corner with a screech and began pelting her with shuriken… that simply bounced off of her annoyed face. When they fell to the desk, Kame saw why; the shuriken were harmless toys folded out of paper. After the failure of their ranged barrage, the attacker leaped up onto the Hoshikage's desk and began assaulting her with tiny arms and legs

"Take that! And that!" The figure, now revealed to be a little boy, swung a fist forward straight into the Hoshikage's face that failed to even budge it. "I'll kill you and become the next Hoshikage!"

"Surashi!" Her voice started out calm, but by the end of the name she was shouting. "What have I told you about stopping these stupid attacks while I'm working!"

"But that's when you don't expect it!" The little boy, probably nine or ten, didn't let up and tried to kick her head, but she grabbed the leg and then picked him up by it, shaking him around. "Hey! No fair! Lemme go, you-"

She flung him off towards the far wall, not very hard but still fast enough to make Kame wince and turn to see the damage. However, he was instead surprised by the sight of Surashi landing with skill beyond his years and sticking out his tongue in defiance. "Nyeh! You're gonna lose to me one of these days!"

The Hoshikage waved a hand and a laser of yellow light scorched the floor underneath Surashi, who made one last disrespectful face and then darted out the door. "Alright, you there, Orochimaru's pawn, my answer is no."

Her expression made it clear that there would be no arguing, so he bit his lip and turned to the door, walking out and down the single flight of steps to be met with the sight of a beautiful sunset. The amazing sight of the Land of Bears' skyline, reds and oranges and yellows mixing together to create a picturesque scene, was enough to make Kame pause in his walking. He started to sit down and admire it until the purple at the very edge reminded him of Haku- _that's right_ , he remembered, _Haku's in this village… somewhere…_

He jogged forward, noting that there were no longer any guards following him, and checked every shop to no avail. After jumping up onto a rooftop, he noticed Haku and a bunch of smaller kids gathered over by the edge of the village in a small courtyard. As he approached, he also noted the empty buildings in this region of the village- no, the empty buildings _all over_ the village. A good half of the houses looked to be unoccupied.

Haku's voice came into earshot: "So me and Kame got away from the Lightning ninja who were chasing us, but then a jonin came and we were too tired to fight him…" little mutters of sadness ran through the group of nine or ten year olds. "-so we had to run away… but he was too fast! He caught up and almost got us, but then our friend Seikaku saw him and used her bow to shoot an arrow. The only problem was, she was a whole kilometer away." Her somber tone kept the kids quiet as they hungered for the conclusion to her story. "The jonin's sword came swinging around towards us, but before he could hurt us, bam!" She tapped herself on the forehead. "Seikaku hit him right between the eyes, and we escaped."

For some reason, Kame was strongly reminded of his own storytelling to the spider children, but his consideration of that point was interrupting by little cheers coming from the kids, which made Kame a little bit confused- that seemed a bit bloodthirsty for their age. However, he recalled that Haku had called Gunaji and Naruko 'lightning ninja' in her story, which connected the final dot in Kame's mind. _Back during the summit, the Hoshikage was complaining about the Hidden Lightning,_ he remembered, _and how they were taking all of the jobs and money. Now there's evidence of people leaving this village and of poverty… I think these kids would clap for any story that ends up with the Hidden Lightning losing_.

Haku saw him and waved. "Hey, Kame! Come on down here!"

He obliged, leaping over to her and giving a little wave to the kids before turning and delivering the bad news: "The Hoshikage said no."

"Oh." Haku visibly saddened at the news. "I guess… okay then." At first, Kame thought with despair that her reaction was due to fear of Orochimaru's inevitable wrath, but her glance towards the kids changed his assessment- _does she want to help the kids?_ After swapping to a more neutral expression, she took off her pack and dug around in it until she found the huge stockpile of rations that she'd packed and offered them to the kids as a parting gift.

After they'd left hearing range, Kame shook his head ruefully. "Haku, those were supposed to last us for at least a week. I guess we have to pick up dinner in the village, now," he said while turning back towards one of the restaurants he'd seen. "Why would you just-"

"I think they need them more." Haku shrugged noncommittally, but her tone was not flippant. "While you had your meeting, I walked around the village, and… they're in trouble, Kame. I don't know why, but they're running out of food and money. People are leaving every week for other villages…"

They arrived at the restaurant, ordered, and ate while making small talk that avoided sensitive topics. Haku told him about the kids, who were supposed to be starting their training at the ninja academy, but couldn't because the teacher had left. That kind of undertraining could prove incredibly dangerous if they ended up over their heads in dangerous situations, and further reinforced Kame's worries about the future of the Hidden Star. Once they finished, Haku paid for their meal, tipping generously, and then they stood and started to walk out of the village, only to be met by the earlier pack of children with Surashi at their lead.

"There they are! That one is working with the Hoshikage!" Surashi pulled out a handful of paper shuriken and began pelting them with the harmless objects as they hurried off towards the gate, dodging clumsy tackles from the other kids. As they neared the border of the village, Kame used his off-hand to fold together a shuriken from his own paper, then caught one of Surashi's and deftly swapped it with the new one. When he weakly threw his creation at Surashi, the boy laughed and picked it up off the ground.

"I'm gonna be Hoshikage one day, and you think you can-" The rest of whatever he was going to say was cut off as Kame detonated the smokebomb held directly next to his head, replaced by loud coughing coming from the spreading dark smoke. Kame suppressed a laugh as he stepped out of the village, but Haku didn't even try to hide her chuckling. As they left the village amid empty threats from the kids, Kame was able to ignore the probably terrible future of the village, if only for a moment.

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"Both villages refused." Despite the oddness of what looked like a completely new body, Orochimaru's voice was the same as ever. "I assume you're going to claim that it wasn't your fault?"

 _How can I play this off?_ Kame considered his options. _If I claim that it wasn't my fault, he'll get upset. If I falsely confess, he'll see through that as well, so… should I just describe the specifics and hope he sees reason?_ For lack of a better option, he chose the final course and tried to steady his voice as best as he could: "Uhm, the Amekage said that he had to finish 'incorporating' the two villages that he took over, and the Hoshikage said that she… uh… she didn't care about your personal vendetta."

Orochimaru leaned back in his throne and grimaced. "You informed her that she was in imminent danger and she refused anyway?"

"She…" Kame trailed off, then swallowed and began to ask a question- but stopped, realizing that Haku was standing beside him and unwilling to risk her getting hurt. "Yes."

"Ask your question." Orochimaru's eyes betrayed no hint of his intent, but Kame knew better than to disobey a direct order and did as he was told.

"What did you mean by saying she was next?"

"I thought that was obvious," the Sannin noted with a patronizing tone. "You disappoint me, Kame. The Tanikage is due to attack another village _very_ soon, and his primary target is the Village Hidden in the Stars."

"But why-" Kame bit his lip in annoyance at his own inability to stop asking questions.

For the moment, at least, Orochimaru wasn't hostile to the incursions. "His reasons don't matter; the facts speak for themselves. Two centuries ago, the Land of Whirlpools was all but wiped out and evidence I gathered implicates him. One century ago, Heat Devil Village was destroyed and everyone inside slaughtered, again leaving behind traces of him. Fifty years years ago, in the wake of the Fourth Shinobi World War, the Village Hidden in the Ashes was eradicated. Twenty-five years ago, the Hidden Snow village was wiped out under similar circumstances. Twelve years ago, the Hidden Hotspring village officially 'disbanded' but the ninja occupying it were never seen again. Six years ago, Haku's clan and their entire village was slaughtered, and three years ago, the Hidden Sound was destroyed by the Tanikage. That makes us long overdue for another one of his attacks, and the Hidden Star is a natural target."

 _The problem with that reasoning is that Haku destroyed her own clan_ , Kame thought. _However… if he isn't lying, and the Tanikage really did all of that…_ "Why not tell the great villages about him?"

Orochimaru's sneer answered the question for him. The visible disgust and pride made crystal clear his opinion on asking for help and essentially admitting defeat to the Tanikage. "No, the great villages are blind. Immediately after the Hidden Sound was destroyed, they were _very_ quick to lay the blame at my feet. I don't need their aid to kill the Tanikage." His eyes dropped out of the middle distance and refocused on Kame. "Now, go. You're to deal with the Hidden Whirlpool and Hidden Waterfall tomorrow, after which we'll lay our final plans. I hope, for your sake, that these next two diplomatic missions prove more successful."

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After the eerie Hidden Rain and struggling Hidden Star, it was surprising to Kame when the Hidden Whirlpool proved to be a completely normal, even thriving village. The Jettokage's silence at the summit left Kame unsure of what to expect, but whatever he had been predicting was not this. In fact, the Whirlpool's many occupants and clearly flourishing economy were both in great health, and its downtown district had more shops than the Sand or the Leaf. The village itself was built out on the water, but unlike the dark and murky moat of the Hidden Rain, the sparkling blue oceanwater simply added to the beauty of the Whirlpool. Made mostly of stone, the huge numbers of buildings spread out onto the mainland and even further into the water, with evidence of construction happening even right then. The buildings themselves had foundations than plunged straight into the surprisingly shallow oceanwater, while networks of bridges and sidewalks made the city traversable and even hustling.

As Kame and Haku walked along the wide main road of the village, constructed of stone and leading directly to the various buildings rather than connecting with bridges, he shied away from the side streets that led out over the water. Growing up in a desert, Kame hadn't ever bothered to learn how to swim, and although he'd heard of the water-walking, he wasn't anxious to try to learn the practice right then and there.

Happy citizens, some clad in the distinctive blue vests of Whirlpool shinobi and wearing the headbands with the swirling spiral pattern, and some in regular civilian wear, filled the streets. Disguised as one of the civilians, Kame itched to enter one of the many, many shops but stayed his course and tried to remain inconspicuous. It wasn't hard to meld into the throng of people as he and Haku gradually made their way towards the Jettokage's tower, meeting no opposition from any of the ninja they passed.

As they walked, Kame took a moment to consider the upcoming negotiations. After the summit, he'd looked into the recent official histories of the present villages, as well as Orochimaru's information on them. The Hidden Star he'd seen in Orochimaru's data was mostly in line with the one he'd seen and the one described in the official books; a village that had long tried to compete with larger ones but with the coming of peacetime had found it harder to stay relevant in the shortage of ninja work.

The Hidden Rain was another story. Neither Orochimaru nor the official records had much information on it after the Great Rebuilding, and even after visiting it in person Kame wasn't sure what was going on within it. His best guess was that the Amekage had used some sort of combination resurrection/genjutsu on the ninja, but that still didn't explain their similar appearances.

Moving on to the Hidden Whirlpool, it was a near-opposite to the Hidden Star. As an age of alliances and peace had been announced, the Mist had been resistant at first but eventually snapped into line. Because of this delay, the wave of unadaptable shinobi who became missing-ninja was much larger and came later than it did for the other villages. Said missing-ninja had moved out into other lands, and the Hidden Whirlpool that had just been re-established by the first Jettokage was in a prime position to take missions to deal with them.

Off of these initial vast profits, the Whirlpool had solidified itself as a legitimate ninja village and actually earned the regular business of the Land of Waves, not to mention large chunks of the Lands of Fire and Water. The first Jettokage was hailed as a genius and as a powerful shinobi, even more so when he'd driven off the three-tails singlehandedly and forced it to retreat towards the southern oceans where it died presumably of its wounds. Since then, the Hidden Whirlpool had only grown as the Jettokage brought together the remnants of both the Chinoike clan and the Uzumaki clan.

The Chinoikes' ketsuryugan eyes and Uzumakis' red hair were both visible in several of the shinobi that Kame and Haku passed on the streets. Kame was shaken out of his thoughts when they arrived at their destination: the tower of the Jettokage, which was at the edge of the city rather than the center. As they approached, a ketsuryugan-eyed guard stepped forward and and challenged them: "State your purpose or leave."

"I'm here to meet with the Jettokage on behalf of the Daimyo of the Land of Salt." No such land existed, but Orochimaru had promised Kame that that specific introduction would get him in for a meeting. Sure enough, at the mention of the Land of Salt, the man's eyes widened and his lip curled slightly.

 _Does he know who we really are?_ Kame wondered, but it was a moot point as the man reluctantly waved them forward. As they stepped into the tower itself, the guard gave them one last warning: "Try anything and we'll make you regret it, _scum_."

Kame, who'd never been one to get upset by the kind of masculine trash-talking that it seemed many people were susceptible to, simply brushed off the threat. _Miriki's insults_ , he thought, _now they're a different story. He makes an art form out of it…_ he felt himself sadden slightly in memory of his friend that he hadn't seen for half a year.

He and Haku continued forward and were directed up a long staircase that spiraled around and up through the tower. Along the way, they stepped on a seal on the ground that dispelled their disguises. Finally, they reached the office of the Jettokage himself and waited patiently until a guard opened the door from the inside and waved them forward to stand before the Jettokage's desk.

Kame walked over until he stood about a meter from the Kazekage's desk, only to see a black seal fade into sight on the ground under his feet. The guard closed the door and spoke in a tone that was about as distrustful as the other guard's: "That seal doesn't allow lying from the people inside it. Hope it isn't too difficult to have some honesty."

Again Kame ignored the jab and faced the Jettokage, who looked even more exhausted than he had at the summit. Deeply sunken eyes with large bags underneath them gazed at Kame and Haku tiredly, and his expression clearly said, 'get on with it.' Kame swallowed nervously before making his request: "Jettokage, I'd like to request-" _Wait, there are still Whirlpool ninja in the room_. "Uh, my request contains _very_ sensitive information that could cause problems were it to fall into the wrong hands…"

The Jettokage slowly turned to look at the guards and nodded once. Kame wasn't sure how to respond, but it turned out he didn't have to; the guards exited and closed the door once more behind themselves. "Lord Orochimaru has asked for your aid in his upcoming assault on the Hidden Valley village."

The Jettokage didn't respond at all, so Kame anxiously continued, starting to panic a little. "We intend to kill the Tanikage and end his…" _Wait_ , he thought, _the Jettokage doesn't know about the history with the Tanikage. Then again, the Tanikage did originally…_ "We want to claim vengeance against the Tanikage for the Hidden Sound and the original Hidden Whirlpool. Don't you want to see the man who's eradicated so many innocent villages brought to justice?"

The Jettokage finally spoke in a wheezing whisper that caused Kame to notice just how old he really was: "Why is Orochimaru better?"

"Well… because Orochimaru cares-" Kame choked off in the same way he had during the interrogation all those months ago in the Sand. He made another attempt: "I know that Orochimaru has hurt less-" and again, the seal didn't let him lie. "Ugh. I _assume_ that Orochimaru hasn't killed as many people as the Tanikage."

"And why is that?" The whispered question threw Kame for a loop briefly.

"Because I trust-" _No, I don't_. "Because I think he's a-" _He's not a good person_. "Because I have to believe that." Kame finally spoke the truth, and it shook him a little bit. The Jettokage still looked expectant, so partly because of his own mental turmoil and partly because of the seal, Kame just spoke his mind. "I have to think that Orochimaru is a good person and is telling the truth, because if he isn't then that makes me evil and a reasonless murderer."

Haku looked at him with concern evident in her expression. "Kame, are you-"

"He uses children." The whisper of the Jettokage still carried enough wait to quiet Haku almost immediately. "Accept your responsibility." Kame shook his head. "I know the cost of lying to myself. Until you can tell me with absolute certainty that you-"

"I'll do as Orochimaru wishes," Kame said without any more hesitation. "I understand that he's done terrible things and will likely continue to do terrible things, but I don't care."

Haku's concerned look only grew stronger, while the Jettokage sank back into his chair defeatedly. "Go," he said, tired again, "My answer is no. The Tanikage and Orochimaru are two evils, but I will not choose a lesser."

The guards came back in and Kame left, applying another transformation jutsu once past the seal that would dismiss it and then marching in complete silence until the Hidden Whirlpool was far behind them. Finally, Haku spoke tentatively: "Kame, are you-"

"I'm fine," Kame snapped.

"No you aren't." Haku's eyes bored into his own and he had to turn away, unable to meet her gaze. "Is Orochimaru… what's going on?" He didn't respond. "Kame?" She spoke more and more urgently. "Kame, what's going on with you!?"

"I don't know," Kame finally muttered. "I think… I don't know, but every second I spend doing Orochimaru's dirty work makes me… I'm evil." Haku started to argue back, but he talked right over her. "I let Hiretsuna kill some kids the other day. I saw Kinzoku murder two ninja and just worried for myself. I saw the Hoshikage trying to do her best with a starving village and all I could think about was how selfish _she_ was for not helping me out…"

Haku grabbed his shoulders and looked straight into his eyes. "Kame, no. What were you supposed to do in any of those situations? Don't apologize when you didn't do anything wrong."

Kame sucked in breath to defend himself, but ended up letting it out raggedly instead and turning back to the road. _I think I should feel better after that_ , he thought, but deep down he just felt worse as he realized that once again Haku had seen him in pain and helped him. It brought his mind back to one night in the Hidden Sand where he hadn't done the same.


	38. Arc 4 Vol 6: The Hidden Waterfall

**(A/N) Apologies for missing two upload days last week; I flew to Las Vegas but forgot to bring my computer. That gave me some time to think things over and I'll likely be doing some work in the near future to improve the earlier story, specifically Deihaka (who's a weak character and a Kakashi copypasta) and some of the fights. I've also gotten conflicting messages on what exactly makes a missing-ninja S-Rank, so I'm scaling off of the akatsuki for that. Sorry once again for missing two days!**

 **Ninja Profile: The Takikage**

Ninjutsu: ?  
Genjutsu: S  
Taijutsu: ?  
Specialties: Jashinism, Immortality, Blessed Water

Description: The Takikage is a man who might have once been of average height but is now stooped with age, long hair and beard gone white and eyes murky from the (if reports are to be believed) over a full century of life he's had. He is perpetually clad in a long black cloak with a red Jashinist symbol that has since become the typical garb for a Hidden Waterfall shinobi. His expression and voice are almost always strained with zeal and glee at whatever religious mandate he's about to utter, while his movements are quick and energetic beyond his supposed age.

Origin: The Takikage has, apparently, been active in several lands for generations, but it was only recently in the Hidden Waterfall village that he began to gain serious traction. Strained economically by the lack of good ninja work and already weakened by several earlier events, the Village Hidden in the Waterfalls was quickly converted to his religion of Jashinism and in a rarely-found peaceful transition of power, the village's previous leader stepped aside to allow him to become the Takikage. After he assumed the role, the village underwent serious changes- a state-mandated religion, massively stricter policies on crime and heresy, and a stronger, if not larger, military force. Since then, any spies of other villages have either been rooted out and executed or converted to his faith, so much of the ninja world keeps a careful eye on the Hidden Waterfall, just in case.

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The ninja cities were typically named as Hidden Villages because in the past, they had been just that- hidden from the public eye. However, with the passage of time, the locations of most of them had become common knowledge, although they did keep the 'hidden' moniker. But as Kame looked up at the monstrously huge tree shooting multiple kilometers into the sky, he refused to believe that anything about the Village Hidden in the Waterfalls had _ever_ been hidden. Outlined by the setting sun that gave it a bright corona, he'd been able to see it from kilometers away and had been moving steadily towards it for the last hour.

As if to add insult to injury, the wooden goliath was a complete eyesore. Despite the descriptions of vibrant and living beauty that Kame had read, the Hidden Waterfall's tree was actually a sickly grey skeleton devoid of leaves. The city built around and even up onto the tree wasn't much better, occasional lights proving the exception to a mostly dark cluster of buildings. The village was about a normal size overall, stretching in a wide circle around the tree's base, but it was nowhere even close to the Rain or Whirlpool in terms of development; few of the buildings were more than two stories high.

As Kame and Haku started down the long slope towards the village's border, even the thick forest that filled every inch of the country started to change. Like the larger tree, the woods looked either dead or dying, leaves dropping to the ground and creating a layer of decay. This effect grew more and more pronounced as they neared their destination, and by the time that the village gates came into view every tree was a husk.

Whatever conversation they'd been making became as dead as the landscape when they crossed a small bridge over a river. The water that a few miles back had been sparkling and clear was now moving slowly and silently, turned reddish by the sunset. Haku hurried a bit more and Kame did the same, disturbed by the thought of taking too long and having to walk back through the eerie patch of woods in the dark.

The increased speed meant that there was still light by the time that they reached the Hidden Waterfall's main gate. Orochimaru had told them that transformations weren't necessary for the Waterfall visit, but Kame was still a bit antsy when two robed forms dashed down into the road and spoke: "You've been sent by Orochimaru?"

Before responding, Kame briefly looked over the Waterfall shinobi. They were both in flowing robes reminiscent of the pictures of the Akatsuki that he'd seen, except theirs were pure black with no red clouds. They each wore red headbands with the Hidden Waterfall's symbol on them, but besides that the only real markings on them were the red circle and triangle marks emblazoned on the chests of their robes. _That's a Jashinist symbol_ , Kame remembered as he cleared his throat before responding in what he hoped to be a confident voice: "Yes we have. Please take us to-"

"You're to follow us." Evidently he wasn't confident-sounding enough, because the Waterfall ninja simply talked right over him and turned to lead them through the now-opening gates. Kame swallowed his annoyance at being dismissed so casually and strode past the huge wooden doors into the Hidden Waterfall itself.

While the Hidden Rain had filled him with unease with its unnatural inhabitants and dark atmosphere, for reasons that Kame couldn't put his finger on the Hidden Waterfall filled him with real terror. Stepping over the threshold and into the Jashinists' territory gave him an immediate and palpable sense of horror that only intensified further as he moved deeper. _This is almost as bad as when Orochimaru's upset with me_ , he thought. _It's almost like the entire city has strong killing intent_.

Even more frustrating was the fact that he had no clue where this feeling was coming from. The wooden buildings were completely normal-looking and, despite the odd uniform, most of the Waterfall shinobi were as well. The civilians were a mixed lot- the majority of them were behaving normally, but a few acted oddly skittish, while another minority of them seemed to be happily staring at Kame with glassy eyes. This last group grew in number as they neared the center of the village until most of the civilians were smiling blankly towards them, with a couple of them even trailing a good distance behind the Sound ninja.

Kame froze up a little bit as he realized that they weren't heading towards the Takikage's tower- in fact, he couldn't see a Takikage tower anywhere. The Waterfall shinobi ahead of them was making straight for what appeared to be some sort of gathering place, surrounded by a thick crowd of civilians and shinobi alike all murmuring and shifting around. Once they grew close enough for the crowd to begin parting around them, he heard a zealous voice that he'd only heard once before: "Those who deny the one true God will not be tolerated!"

A roar of approval came from the crowd, although Kame noticed a few restrained faces among the sea of bloodthirsty ones. The Takikage's voice kept coming, sounding more and more intense: "We see the light of salvation and our vigilance will save us from being dragged into the darkness!" Another roar, even more vicious, shook Kame a little more than he thought it would. "When heretics snap at our heels, distracting us from the true path, will we fall victim?"

As the gathered masses shouted "No!' in unison, Kame finally breached through to the front and nearly ran into the railing that held the crowd back. Off the edge of the railing, the stone ground of the village abruptly dropped off into a wide, clear pool of water that disappeared off underneath the roots. The pool was hemmed in on three sides by the tree's wooden roots and seemed to be fed by a waterfall that poured down through a hole in the tree itself.

Kame gasped and unconsciously leaned forward a bit over the railing as he saw the ten-meter-by-ten-meter metal platform that was suspended over the water, attached by chains on the four corners to roots. On the platform itself stood the black-robed old man Kame recognized as the Takikage, as well as another desperate-looking woman in civilian clothing but also wearing a Hidden Stone headband. The Takikage had the crowd whipped up into a fever pitch with his proclamations, but had slowed down and spoke now in a gentler tone. "However, when I look upon this nonbeliever who has rejected the will of Jashin," _That confirms it_ , Kame thought. "-All I can feel is pity."

The crowd went back to murmuring, apparently split between the fervor his earlier words had inspired and the new message he gave them now. The woman staggered a bit, clearly sobbing and exhausted, but the pity vanished from the Takikage's voice and was replaced once again with zealous anger: "The heretic's crimes are clear, as is her punishment- those who cannot unite with Jashin in this life, must be forced to join him in the next!" Kame felt the crowd surge and realized just how skilled of an orator the man was; he somehow sounded reasonable and gentle while talking about killing someone and the crowd ate it up.

"But while Jashin is not a merciful god; I am a kind man. This pitiful creature's life may have been wasted in Jashin's eyes, but let her death not also be so!" The crowded people all cheered their assent while the woman paled in horror. The Takikage turned to face her and continued in an even more fervent voice: "Oh Jashin, purveyor of our realm and ruler of the next, grant me your blessing. Lend your power to my hand so I may create true art from the dirt and filth of our world!" He thrust an open palm with fingers curled forward towards the now-standing woman and in the air before it, a dark red symbol of a circle with three triangles within flashed briefly.

Immediately after the flicker of Jashin's symbol, another human figure appeared in a similar flare of the dark red light. This one was revealed to be a tall man wearing the same Hidden Stone headband as the woman, but clad in shinobi clothing and a Stone chunin's vest. His face swiftly moved from impassiveness to confusion and then to happiness as he looked at the woman: "Mori! It's you, but how am I…"

"No…" the woman, Mori, breathed. "No. Haru… you died." She trembled slightly and moved forward a few steps, moving from the far left of the platform more towards the center. "We married for a week, and then… this isn't possible. _I watched you die!_ "

"I remember being-" The man's voice choked off.

"Servant of Jashin, your path is clear." The Takikage's eyes glinted with mad glee and a tendril of darkness ran through the air into the back of the new man, who flinched and collapsed before rising to his feet once more. His eyes now had symbols of Jashin in black over red irises and rather than continue talking, he drew a kunai.

"Mori, you… I can't stop myself! Mori, run, now!" The woman stumbled backwards from Haru's charge, evading a few swings of his kunai. "Go! Get out of here!" She turned to look towards the root as if judging the jump distance, which proved to be a terrible mistake as Haru made several handsigns and then spoke through gritted teeth: "Lightning Style: Shock Prison- No!"

Despite his protest, it was too late and a ball of Stone rushed forward, homing in on Mori. She tried to dodge but it altered course and hit her dead-on before expanding across her body and apparently paralyzing her. After dropping to her knees, she sagged forward slightly and begged: "Haru, why…"

"I can't…" He stepped forward and put one hand behind her head, holding the kunai in the other. "No… please, whatever's going on, stop it now…" but the despair in his voice didn't change anything. The kunai was pulled back slowly and then shoved directly into Mori's chest, causing her to cough up a splatter of blood. Despite the dark symbols, Haru's eyes held absolute horror at his actions, while Mori's own face was locked in an expression of fear and sorrow.

For an incredibly long moment, they remained like that, and then finally Haru disappeared in another flash and Mori flopped onto the ground. Her blood ran off the sides of the platform and stained the water far more than it should have, little explosions of red spreading with every drop. Another robed figure dropped down beside her, picked her up, and dropped her whole body over the edge, but rather than simply sinking into the water, when she met the clear fluid her entire corpse dissolved into red that spread and stained the water into a color that Kame knew all too well.

 _That's… that's the same color as the river that we walked by on the way here_ , he thought incredulously. Even more unnatural, the red color somehow ran _up_ the waterfall and into the tree, which the Takikage looked at and then smiled with glee. "The sacrifice pleases our lord Jashin!"

This round of roaring from the crowd was much more zealous than angry this time, while the Takikage smiled wider than ever while leaning back and raising his arms: "Praise Jashin!"

"Praise Jashin!" the crowd howled right back.

Kame looked towards Haku, who seemed just as horrified as he was by the events. She met his eyes and then mouthed, 'We should leave'. Before he could nod his agreement to that assertion, a cold hand seized the back of his neck and he flinched at the equally cold voice coming from right beside his ear: "Praise Jashin."

Swallowing, he turned slowly to see a robed Waterfall ninja with their hood up and shadowing their face. Unfortunately, the man decided to pull said hood down, which immediately led to Kame wishing the he hadn't as the disgusting mess that was his face was revealed. Long stitches ran from the corners of his mouth to his ears in a grotesque mockery of a smile, while another long stitch trailed up from his chin to his forehead, splitting his face in half, and ended in another symbol of Jashin etched onto his forehead in thread.

"P- Praise Jashin," Kame stammered, hoping that that was what the man wanted to hear. Rather than sticking around and showing his reaction, the hideous Waterfall ninja simply threw a long blade towards the tree with apparent ease. The projectile flew forward faster than Kame's eyes could track and impaled itself nearly a foot deep in the tree's bark, leaving behind a long thread that trailed back into his sleeve. With another powerful yank, the man launched himself along after his weapon and ended up standing atop it with crossed arms.

Kame recovered enough to start thinking more analytically, and two major details suddenly registered in his mind: Firstly, that stitching was exactly like the descriptions of Kakuzu, a Waterfall missing-ninja and prominent member of the akatsuki, and secondly, that weapon was the Stitching Blade, one of the seven swords of the Hidden Mist. _When we attacked, Orochimaru said that all seven belonged to the Mist,_ Kame thought, _so… does that mean the Waterfall recently captured one?_

"Master," the man said to the Takikage, "Orochimaru's sheep have come."

The Takikage turned back towards the crowd, eyes finally settling on Kame, then smiled and continued in the same announcer's voice. "Jashin's will has been carried out and you may all return to your homes happy in the knowledge that you witnessed such glory." The crowd rapidly dispersed but Kame and Haku remained motionless, at least until the guards ushered them towards the side.

A short walk later, Kame found himself standing before a cavern carved into the tree itself, dimly lit and shrouded almost completely in darkness. He hesitated before entering through the hole, but the guard grunted in annoyance and shoved him forward regardless. Once inside the cavern, he actually found himself appreciating it- the huge and intricate carvings lining the walls were impressive to say the least, depicting people with weapons buried inside of them or missing their body parts streaming along a path towards something at the very end of the chamber.

Once they got closer, Kame saw what it was- a huge statue carved from dead wood of a humanoid yet demonic creature in a sitting position. One massive eye with Jashin's symbol as its pupil gazed forward and its legs kneeled, a throne placed between them. Each arm reached forward with a flat and open palm, and on the palms stood two figures while a third figure sat in the throne itself. A pool of the bloodstained water formed a moat of sorts, over which there was a long bridge that Kame and Haku marched across until that stood on a round platform with the three figures to the front and either side of them.

The guard backed off into the shadows, but Kame noticed with a slight chill that they weren't alone- tens of the guards lined the walls, dark robes blending in but not completely hiding them. His focus was redirected when the form on the throne spoke in the aged-yet-vigorous voice of the Takikage: "So Orochimaru has come calling for his favor. Tell me, misguided young ones, what has your apostate master sent you to request?"

"Uh…" Kame tried to think quickly. Orochimaru had said that he'd done the Waterfall some service, so they'd likely help in order to repay their debt. "I want- er, Orochimaru wants you to aid us in our assault on the Village Hidden in the Valley. He said that you should honor the debt that-"

The Takikage waved a hand and Kame immediately quieted. "Orochimaru is a heretic, and any agreement he believes he made is of little consequence. Those who spit on Jashin are not _worthy_ of any honor."

Kame swallowed, formulating possible arguing points in his mind- however, at Haku's next words, any planning he was doing instantly fell apart. "Like that woman? Was she unworthy of your honor?" Her tone was clearly accusatory. "Is that why you killed-"

"Silence." The form on the right spoke in the cold tone Kame remembered as the Stitching Blade user's from earlier. "If any more heresy passes through your lips, I'll sew them shut."

"Calm yourself, Sutetchi," the Takikage said in a placating voice. "They may be nonbelievers, but their youth is apparent- they haven't rejected Jashin, merely never known his embrace."

The person to their left, someone Kame didn't recognize by voice or silhouette, chipped in their own opinion in a soft and flowery tone: "Maybe you two'll feel a little better if you know that Mori was a spy for the Stone?"

Strangely enough, that _did_ ease Kame's heart a bit, but the Takikage once again overruled his subordinate. "That has no bearing on her passing." Turning back to Kame and Haku, he continued in a teacher's explanatory and patient voice: "Mori was someone who'd seen and rejected the Will of Jashin, damning her to an eternity of suffering for her neglect. I gave her a death that pleased Jashin, ensuring that she would be judged favorably and granting her entrance to the perfection available only to the Blessed of Jashin."

"But you brought back someone she loved- you made them both suffer. Why does Jashin want you to hurt people?" Haku wasn't relenting, even though Kame was yanking slightly on her arm, terrified of the consequences that the crazed religious lunatics might inflict upon them.

The Takikage's mouth curved into a smile and he leaned back in his chair. "You presume much to ask for the secrets of the Will of Jashin, but I find no greater pleasure than in spreading the words of ultimate truth. Jashin is God, the one true God, and He rules the next world while watching over this filthy and transient waste that we occupy now. In His true domain, achievable only through death, people may find true salvation and happiness or everlasting torment. Jashin is not merciful, and those who walked lives ignorant or even insolent towards Him are punished severely, while those who place their faith in Him are rewarded more richly than any mind could comprehend.

"Above all else, Jashin is all-knowing, and He sees everything that happens in our material world. Death can be terrible or beautiful, and the difference is _everything_ , because while an ignorant heretic's death displeases Jashin, the deaths that embody artful perfection can redeem even a lost soul." _That's what he was doing to that woman_ , Kame thought with a chill. "Mori was doomed, but by giving her a poetic death, I rescued her in the eyes of Jashin. Because of my faith, I have been given the power to make his will a reality, and I do so with the strongest convictions, as do the honored First and Second Acolytes," the Takikage's long speech finally winded down.

"But how-" Kame got sucked into Haku's reckless questioning as he considered all the information laid before him. "How do you know all this to be true?" _That's always been my problem with religion_ , he thought, _the whole idea of putting my faith in something that can't be proved wasn't ever appealing to me_.

"You _dare_ to question-" Sutetchi growled.

"Sutetchi, enough," the Takikage said. "I know this to be true because I have stood before Jashin himself, and He has given me powers beyond what humanity could accomplish, as He has done with First Acolyte Sutetchi and Second Acolyte Yudoku. Our spreading of salvation would not be possible without His blessing." _So does that mean that… is Jashin the real God? But…_

Kame shook himself back into the task at hand. "Orochimaru is intent on killing the Tanikage, and we could seriously use your help in doing that."

"He's attacking the Hidden Valley? That's a _lot_ of souls that might get wasted, Master," Yudoku warned.

"Ugh, they're undeserving of Jashin's blessing," Sutetchi complained.

The Takikage seemed to absorb the two differing opinions, consider for a while, and then finally delivered his answer first to Sutetchi: "Forget not that the brush with which you paint the blessed deaths is in your possession thanks only to Orochimaru's aid." Then turning to Yudoku, he spoke more agreeably: "You're correct, but remember that we cannot hope to save every soul." Kame shuddered as he realized just how secure in his motivations the Takikage really was; he truly believed that he was a champion saving the eternal souls of everyone he killed. Finally turning towards the two Sound ninja, he tilted his head slightly. "The Tanikage is the greatest evil of our world; someone who has inartfully slaughtered more lives than any other mortal. To see the world rid of him is indeed something that Jashin would be glad of…

"The Waterfall will aid you in your assault," the Takikage decided. "Sutetchi, lead the third platoon in support of Orochimaru's forces when they attack…"

"At sunset in three days," Kame supplied helpfully.

"You may rely on the Waterfall to lend their assistance in the endeavor," the Takikage smiled. He might have gone on for another monologue about the many benefits of Jashinism, but at that moment a dark-robed figure dashed into the room and spoke in Sutetchi's ear hurriedly.

Sutetchi nodded and then turned to the Takikage: "Master, several Stone ninja have arrived in an ill-fated rescue mission."

"Give them the same honours as their comrade," the Takikage said, the gleeful zeal back in his voice. He rose and disappeared behind the statue, so Kame darted off after Sutetchi with a morbid curiosity and noted Haku doing the same.

As they leaped across the rooftops towards a minor scuffle at the border, Sutetchi spoke in the same cold voice back towards them: "Do not interfere. I'll give them a death that will make Jashin proud, but if you interfere you might hurt them forever."

Kame nodded even though the man couldn't see him, still unsure about Jashin but more than willing to obey the orders of his host. When they arrived at the battle, Kame saw a group of three Stone ANBU launching several elemental jutsu towards cloaked Waterfall shinobi and maintaining a sort of standoff for the moment. That all changed as Sutetchi jumped straight into the battle and onto a piece of clay on the ground, drawing out a gleeful shout from one of the Stone ninja: "Ha! Wrong move, idiot, now explode!"

The clay detonated, enveloping Sutetchi in a fireball of power, but when it cleared he was left standing there and completely unharmed, although his cloak had been reduced to shreds. Now the imposing man- no, _child_ was left fully revealed, and his hands and feet weren't actually his hands and feet. The small form of a nine-or-ten-year-old boy had long threads extending from his arms and legs to make him seem larger than he actually was, but in truth Sutetchi was only maybe 4'3". Even his voice, which before had intimidated Kame, was now significantly less imposing when coming from such a small body: "Today, you will meet Jashin."

The threads retracted into the stitched lining Sutetchi's body, leaving him a shirtless and scrawny-looking child wearing a shin-length black cloth around his waist. As he lowered himself into a combat stance and drew the Stitching Blade, Kame noticed that he had stitched lines in tally marks all over his back; thirty-seven in total. The ANBU seemed taken aback for the moment, which cost the detonater dearly when the needle-like Stitching Blade was flung right under his guard, through his thigh and into the ground on the other side, leaving a trailing thread that led back to Sutechi.

Sutetchi charged around the man, who was uselessly hacking away at the thread stuck in his leg, then retrieved the sword and threw it once more. In the process, one of the other ANBU sent a stone spear flying towards him and landed a direct hit through his chest- but it was ineffective. He yanked the spear out and kept moving around the now doubly injured ANBU, entangling him with two non-lethal puncture wounds and wrapping his arms but avoiding any lethal damage.

As the Waterfall's First Acolyte picked up the Stitching Blade, Kame noticed that the other Waterfall ninja were hanging back and seemingly enjoying the show. Sutetchi turned back to the two still-alive Hidden Stone ANBU, who were each readying their own jutsu, and Kame noted that the stitched tally marks on his back had been reduced to thirty-six in number. For some reason, he then launched the Stitching Blade skyward and stood still with arms crossed. The two ANBU finished up almost simultaneously, shouting in tandem: "Lightning Style-" and "Fire Style-"

They were cut off, though, when the Stitching Blade fell down on the opposite side of them and Sutetchi somehow _disappeared_ and reappeared at its location. The thread attached to his arm seemed to follow the course of his teleportation, also appearing in a straight line that took it right through the stomachs of both Stone ANBU and stopping their jutsu. Now the thread was incapacitating one and punched through two more, and although all three of them were struggling against it, Sutetchi raised the needlelike weapon with a euphoric look. "Oh almighty Jashin, please accept this meager sacrifice in your name!"

Then he plunged it straight through his own chest and heart, and all three ANBU made choking noises before stopping their struggles and collapsing. He let go of the sword and it whipped back along its path, punching back through the corpses as its attached thread was sucked back into his hand and eventually returning to his grip. Kame noticed three more small lines appearing in the childlike First Acolyte's back, bringing the total up to thirty-nine, as he sheathed the Stitching Blade once more and walked off towards the town. "Jashin is pleased!"

A cheer went up from the nearby Waterfall ninja, and Kame could see why- while macabre and definitely unnecessarily complicated, the way he'd woven together the battlefield and finished all three enemies in a single stroke had been beautiful. _An artful death would be pleasing to-_

"Ugh!" He shook his head in a vain attempt to clear it of the dangerous thoughts, which seemed to draw the attention of Sutetchi.

"Was something about that _displeasing_ to you?" Despite his childlike appearance, Sutetchi's voice did an excellent job of promising terrible things to come if Kame confirmed that he'd shaken away thoughts of Jashin.

 _What's a good excuse, here?_ Kame thought about the situation, and he realized that something actually _was_ off about the whole fight. Nothing about any ANBU that he'd ever read or experienced had involved poorly-thought-out frontal assaults, except for when there was an ulterior motive… "I think this was a distraction."

"You thought right." The soft and kind voice of Yudoku, the Second Acolyte, trailed in from behind them. Kame turned to see the person he'd previously known as only a silhouette, now revealed in the fading sunset light as a little girl. Despite being paler than normal and speaking with wisdom beyond her years, she (unlike Sutetchi) was otherwise apparently a normal-looking little girl. However, behind her walked a ten-foot-long salamander with another Stone ANBU on its back, this one literally frothing at the mouth and moaning in pain. "But I made sure that our friend is gonna make it to heaven."

Once more, Kame shuddered at the thought- an entire village of shinobi confident that every enemy they killed would end up with eternal happiness. For some reason, the thought unnerved him to his very core. Sutetchi was unimpressed, and for the first time he seemed to act a little bit more like the age he looked: "I got three of them in the time it took you to get one, Yudoku."

In comparison, Yudoku just seemed to speak with even more adult words and mannerisms: "Yours just died in a fleeting instant, but mine is going to live for three whole weeks on the edge of death. Jashin's grace will go to me!"

"Nuh-uh." Sutetchi crossed his arms. "You drag this stuff out way too long."

"And you get it over with way too fast." Yudoku turned and began to walk away, followed by Sutetchi and all of the Waterfall ninja. Kame and Haku seemed to be gone from their minds already, so with a quick shared glance and a shrug they walked to the main road and then off towards Orochimaru's base.

Along the way, Kame felt the urge to finally get a weight off of his chest and tell Haku something. "Haku, I need to tell you… when I first started to help you, it was because-" but before he could mention the genjutsu, his throat closed up. _Come on_ , he thought, _grow a pair. Just tell her, now! It's not fair to let her think that-_

 _But it's not fair to take away her trust in her only friend_. Kame bit his lip, unable to make himself admit to his lack of virtue. _I can pretend it's selfless, but… I'm hiding the truth from her, and that's not an honorable thing. If I can't even he a good person to her, then-_ he realized with a lot of mixed emotions that Haku was his moral last stand. Every time he'd felt himself start to get swamped with doubts and every time he'd wondered if he was a good person, Haku had been the solid ground that he'd rested his peace of mind on. "I was a bully before and I'm a criminal now. I've never been a good person," he finished lamely.

"Actually, Kame…" Haku's expression, scarily enough, mirrored his own mental state. With worry, bitterness, and indecision mixing together on her face, she finally seemed to gather herself and continued speaking. "The… the night before you and me went to meet Shira, I…" she trailed off, and Kame knew why. _That's when she…_

He suddenly felt like his throat was dry and wanted to say something, _anything_ , but was terrified of saying something wrong. He didn't dare risk telling her what he knew, or risk scaring her into not mentioning it at all, so he held his tongue and hoped. Seconds stretched on until eventually, she cleared her throat and set her gaze straight ahead away from his eyes before speaking in a slightly hoarse voice. "That night when Tetsute kicked me out of the restaurant," _and I watched it happen_ , Kame added, "When I went home, I… I wasn't thinking, and I… just gave up and thought that, if my whole life was gonna be the same crappy loneliness, then maybe…"

Her voice had gone from ragged but firm to an ashamed whisper as she finally put the dreaded memory into words: "I tried to kill myself, Kame. I was lucky that Gaara came and saved me, because if he hadn't…" _Then what?_ Kame thought somewhat harshly. _Maybe you wouldn't be running around the nations as a-_

He silenced those thoughts immediately, because as bad as this situation was, it was far better than living on with Haku dead because of his own negligence. Haku had stopped talking, and when he glanced over to her, her face was flushed red and she had her lips pressed together in shame. Finally, she spoke once more, still avoiding his eyes and using a weak voice, "Kame, since you helped me find Shira, I've been happier than I can remember being. I was so sure that I didn't want to go on with my life, but it's because of all the ways you helped me that I'm standing here alive. We might be in a shitty place right now, but you helped show me that being in a crappy situation in the present is no reason to throw away your future. As far as I'm concerned, you're the best person I've ever met, and no matter what happens that's not going to change"

"No, just because I didn't leave you alone doesn't make me-" Kame froze as, for the third time since they'd left the Hidden Leaf, Haku moved in front of him and wrapped her arms around his shoulders. His voice fell away and he at first hesitantly and then forcefully returned the hug, laying his head beside hers and letting out a deep breath that he hadn't known he'd been holding.

"Stop blaming yourself and just accept it, okay?" Haku's voice was no longer fragile, but it remained gentle and amazingly personal as it came from just beside his ear. "You're nice, and funny, and you helped me when others wouldn't, and Orochimaru can't take that away from you."


	39. Arc 4 Vol 7: Final Preparations

**Ninja Profile: Nise Uzumaki**

Ninjutsu: S  
Genjutsu: S  
Taijutsu: A  
Specialties: Sealing, Diplomacy, Uzumaki techniques

Description: Nise Uzumaki is a middle-aged man of normal build and height, once having the deep red hair of his clan but losing it early in his life and now goes completely bald. His eyes are also sunken and perpetually ringed with dark circles and crows' feet, while his posture is stopped beyond his years and he speaks in a wheezing whisper, all of which gives off the impression of complete exhaustion at all times.

Origin: Nise Uzumaki was one of the few remaining roaming Uzumakis, a minor villageless ninja that popped up occasionally over the years. However, around forty years after the Fourth Shinobi World War, he showed up for good in the remnants of the Land of Whirlpools and used his powerful charisma and powerful mastery of sealing to secure it as a safe space for a new shinobi village. He resurrected both his clan and the Chinoike clan in this new village, uniting several living members and even tracking down those who were unaware of their heritage, populating the village at an unheard-of rate and succeeding beyond all expectations. Managing to fight off several tailed beasts alone, he quickly earned a reverent reputation and has never stopped supporting the growth and prosperity of his village.

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"The Waterfall promised to send one of their platoons and someone called the First Acolyte, Sutetchi." Kame didn't see any sign that Orochimaru had even registered his words, so he licked his lips anxiously and kept talking. "I don't know how many people that means, but I think it should help us keep the Hidden Valley forces busy while we go after the Tanikage, although I'm worried that they might kill the Valley shinobi instead of-"

"What!?" For the first time since Kame had met the man, Orochimaru seemed completely at a loss for words. That didn't last very long, though, and soon he was speaking again in the low and dangerous voice that Kame had learned to fear: "Are you seriously operating under some delusion of sparing the Valley shinobi?"

"I…" Kame frowned. "I thought we were trying to kill the Tanikage." _No_ , he realized, _that really is a complete delusion. They're going to try to stop us and we're not going to show them any mercy. Gunaji and Keikiro and… Miriki-_

"Get any ridiculous notion of sparing them out of your mind immediately." Orochimaru was now showing emotion, narrowing his eyes and talking sharply in the voice he used to give orders during missions. "The Tanikage _will_ watch his village and everyone inside of it destroyed, just as I did, and then we will kill him."

"Why? You haven't made any emotional choices like this before," Haku pointed out. Kame's eyes widened in fear at the direct questioning of Orochimaru's decision-making abilities, but thankfully they were spared the unpredictable wrath of the Sannin.

"The Tanikage has killed hundreds and you balk at the idea of punishing him."

Kame shook his head. "I don't see why destroying a whole village and becoming mass murderers-" Something dawned on him. "Wait, why hasn't the Tanikage been dealt with by the Shinobi Union!? If he really did kill all those people, then shouldn't they have… wait, you were lying to us, weren't you?"

Orochimaru dropped back into an emotionless, guarded expression. "I would be _far_ more careful with my words were I in your shoes, Kame, as you've pushed my limited patience to the edge of breaking. We leave in two days for the Land of Rivers, and if you show any more signs of treachery or lack of faith in my leadership, I will kill you." The simple statement, unshrouded by veiled threats, shocked Kame to his core. _I'll die if I push him any further, and if I don't help him kill the people in the Hidden Valley, then…_

"The Shinobi Union was useless when it was formed and is still useless now- it and the blowhards who control it serve no purpose but to reinforce the Five Kages' control over the minor villages and lands. The Tanikage has destroyed five villages and suffered no consequences for his actions. I went to them with evidence under a flag of truce and they met me with treachery and attacks, and I realized that they'd been with him from the beginning. Whether through ignorance, corruption, or even fear, they've swallowed every excuse that he's spoon-fed them over the years.

"The Land of Whirlpools, Hidden Ash, and Hidden Snow were considered to be destroyed by 'unforeseen circumstances', but their investigations were inconclusive. My own examination yielded a conclusion that all three of them shared similar damages and causes of death to the Hidden Sound, as well as the shattered fortress of the Yorutsume clan and Heat Devil Village. One man has been responsible for all of this destruction, and I know that man to be the Tanikage, and I will not allow him to walk the earth while Mitsuki-"

Orochimaru immediately cut himself short, and Kame took the opportunity to consider something he'd just said: _Haku's clan was destroyed in a similar way to all those other places… does that mean that she lied and it was the Tanikage who… but why would she do that? The other option would be that Haku was the one who destroyed all those other places, but that's not possible, so… Is Orochimaru still lying, even now?_

Orochimaru resumed speaking, in full control once again. "The Tanikage has successfully masked his actions behind scapegoats, myself included, but I will prevent him from getting away with anything more. You two both lost your ancestral homes to his insane destructions, so you of all people should be happy to aid in my vengeance against him."

 _The other Valley shinobi didn't do anything_ , Kame wanted to say, but held his tongue for fear of the Sannin's promises of death. Instead, he bowed his head and mumbled, "Yes, Lord Orochimaru."

"Maintain that deference and you'll likely be spared," Orochimaru said with a smile that, on his new body, evoked more terror than happiness. His new form was in shape and size very similar to the old, but the subtle differences- slightly flatter nostrils, long fangs, and slit-pupiled eyes- made all the difference in causing him to be significantly creepier than before. "Now, I suppose it's best to brief all of you on the mission now, in case any final preparations might take time to complete."

Kame wasn't exactly sure what that meant, but after a few minutes of silence that seemed to just drag on and on, Sankuryu appeared in the doorway and strode up to stand with the two smaller ninja. Soon after, Himei and Seikaku followed suit, after which Orochimaru clapped his hands together and started speaking. "In two days, we're to attack the Hidden Valley village and destroy the Tanikage by any means necessary. To this end, I'm now going to brief you on all the information I've consolidated about him."

Sankuryu and Seikaku both nodded silently, while Himei crossed his arms and voiced his concerns: "Lord Orochimaru, you promised me a permanent cure for Aisuru by the end of this week. Why-"

"You'll receive your reward when the Tanikage is dead," Orochimaru hissed. "Your abilities are incredibly necessary for the attack, which I'll explain further shortly. For now, you all need to understand what our enemy is capable of: he's been alive for centuries, the means of which I am unaware but suffice to say he appears to be a young man and has remained that way for years. In looking through the files of the Shinobi Union and any other records available, I quickly came to realize that there is very little public information on him to be had, but through personal observation and thorough research I've amassed enough data to confidently outline his abilities.

"The Tanikage has been a shinobi on par with those beyond Kage level; he's killed any tailed beast that spawns in his lands without apparent injury and has done the same to any trespassers with the exception of the akatsuki. His attacks have all been quick and usually end with a single attack- one in which he kills every living creature within a few kilometers. While it takes several seconds to charge and doesn't instantly finish off those caught in it, that move has been effective enough to reduce entire villages to husks.

"During his attack on the Hidden Sound, that technique was enough to destroy almost the whole city with only a few shinobi using defensive techniques at the last minute to survive it. Grandmother, a clone of mine called Mitsuki, Sarada Uchiha, Boruto Uzumaki, a few other Sound jonin, and myself were able to group together to fight him, but it was ultimately useless; he disabled the entire group in a millisecond and executed the jonin shortly after. Mitsuki managed to re-energize himself but chose to sacrifice himself to save an unconscious Sarada, after which Grandmother evacuated any living survivors. Even after using my rebirth and facing him in open combat, he was capable of simply absorbing any attack I threw towards him and nearly killing me with another attack."

Kame swallowed- he'd been expecting a list of strengths and weaknesses, but this was just sounding more and more like an unwinnable fight with every detail he learned. _Boruto Uzumaki, Sarada Uchiha, and Mitsuki,_ he thought, _another legendary team from the Leaf, now reduced to only one member_. "Sarada and Boruto, who'd both been knocked out for the entire fight, ended up assuming that it was me who killed their teammate. It was my word against theirs, so naturally the blame was laid at my feet."

Orochimaru's increasingly bitter tone suddenly jumped back to square one; the oozing drawl that he used for most of his interactions. "That massive jutsu is the greatest weapon in his arsenal. All accounts I've found support him using it during all the other massacres I listed earlier, and autopsies show that it kills through simultaneous chakra exhaustion and soul extraction. During our attack, we'll likely be fighting him in his own village, which means he'll be hesitant to use it. We need to incapacitate him through Himei's genjutsu, after which I'll paralyze him temporarily and Kame will detonate the sixtails bomb."

Kame's eyes widened. _Wait, I'm the one who has to… but…_ However, he wasn't given any more time to worry, because Orochimaru kept speaking. "Furthermore, the Tanikage's extreme power does have a weak point, as the only times that there are accounts of him being injured or pushed to any sort of limit are those that occur shortly before his massacres. This and the autopsies lead me to believe that his huge-area jutsu serves to grant him power and life force; which would also introduce a motive- they give him the energy to wield huge strength and stay alive far longer than other humans.

"He is long, _long_ overdue to commit another of these atrocities, assuming the pattern of halving times between attacks holds true. Our overarching plan is simple- mobilize the village, separate him from his shinobi, prevent him from using the ultimate jutsu. After that, we should be able to destroy his precious village and kill him with very little difficulty," Orochimaru said in a satisfied tone of voice, before rapidly shifting back into a more serious state and then continuing: "If we lose the element of surprise, the situation becomes significantly more complicated.

"The Tanikage's combat style relies heavily upon his obscene amounts of power. He's capable of several wide-area damage oriented ninjutsu, and his speed and strength are also chakra-augmented beyond the limits of humans. If he manages to avoid the auditory genjutsu of Himei, then our strategy shifts to using whatever methods available to inflict non-lethal damage or otherwise incapacitate him. Either way, the end goal is the same- I will use a snake binding to paralyze him long enough to witness his village's destruction, and then we execute him once and for all." Orochimaru waved his hands outwards. "Now go, you're all dismissed until we leave the day after tomorrow."

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Kame laid a few final bolts into place over the repaired metal, screwing them as tightly as he could manage, then leaned back and took a moment to admire his work. There had definitely been a reason that Sasori had opted not to even bring the Emperor puppet with him on his final mission- the damage it had sustained, while not irreparable, was crippling. Even with the original blueprints, it had taken Kame most of the last day and a half to patch up the massive hole something had punched through its chest.

Trying and failing to suppress a triumphant smile, Kame's hand twitched towards the puppet- but he curled his fingers into a fist and shoved them into his pocket rather than making the chakra threads. If there was one thing Kankuro had taught him, it was to not bite off more than he could chew, and with all the various poisons and sheer power that Emperor held, any mistake could prove very costly. He instead chose to make some final inspections of the massive weapon.

It was heavily armored, but not in the way of a samurai- huge plates of dark blueish-green metal wrapped in large segments around its upper and lower legs and arms. A kilt of sorts composed of smaller segments wrapped around its waist, while one final huge breastplate guarded its chest. Instead of the human face Kame had expected for some reason, Emperor had a rounded helmet whose eye and mouth holes showed only darkness underneath (although _he_ knew that the mouth contained compressed canisters that sprayed alternatively poisonous gas or fire).

All nine vertical feet of the Emperor's construction showed what a mechanical and puppetry genius Sasori had truly been. While unliftable due to its weight, limiting its mobility, it had been designed to be walked on two massive legs and concealed actual piston and gear systems that multiplied the power efficiency of its movements. Kame was confident that it was strong enough to punch through solid rock and armored well enough to ignore most attacks, and the additional weaponry it held was enough to literally make him drool. Various gas sprays, ranged explosives, short-range trump cards, one smaller detachable puppet, and more…

Kame snapped himself out of the reverential state he'd been in and desummoned Emperor back into its scroll, then thought a little bit more about preparations. Puppetry was out of the question, as the only one he had access to was Emperor itself and that one was way above his pay grade. Beyond that, he relied mostly on weapons and paperbombs, so he decided to double his reserves before the fight just in case. After the last six months of practice, the motions of drawing and applying chakra to the paperbombs' seals was practically second nature to him. The elemental bombs took longer, but not by much, and in less than one hours' time he was shuffling the various types into neat stacks on top of his dresser.

Next came the weapons, which he dealt with a lot more focused and carefully while retrieving another weapon from Sasori's arsenal. The far more famous and deadly purple venom of the dead puppet master was liquid in nature and _very_ difficult to work with; Kame was fairly certain that Sasori's ability to apply and use it in most of his attacks stemmed from the fact that he wasn't conventionally alive and didn't have to worry about proximity to the poison. Kame, on the other hand, wasn't so lucky; the poison would leave him with three days of paralyzation and pain to live if it happened to touch his bare skin. That wasn't something Kame was willing to risk, so he tabled the deadliest venom (at least for the moment) and looked for something else to use.

Luckily, his predecessor had kept generous stores of previous venoms locked away in his laboratory. While all of these had been reappropriated by Orochimaru after Sasori's death, a startling large number of them were missing and marked off in the inventory as 'Traded to Waterfall'. With a minor shudder, Kame remembered the salamander-controlling Yodoku and the way she'd bragged about how her poison would maximize the suffering of the Sand ANBU afflicted by it. Although Orochimaru still had the composition of the various poisons logged down, Kame had neither the time nor the ingredients to put new batches together, so he was left with access to only three of the original nineteen.

One of them had been researched by the Shinobi Union and had its cure widely distributed, thus making it useless, and another one was integral to the process of creating human puppets- a process that required the kekkeigenkai of Sasori and was therefore also useless to Kame. That left one final poison, but despite the trend of its neighbors, it proved to be exactly what Kame was looking for. A quick-acting weakening agent which gradually developed into complete paralysis that began upon contact with a person's bloodstream, its effects were perfect for Kame to use. Furthermore, unlike the permanently liquid nature of Sasori's crown jewel poison, this one was painted onto weapons and dried into a solid layer that would _only_ dissolve back into a liquid upon contact with the blood that would carry it.

He took the generous stores of it that Sasori had been kind enough to store in another storage scroll and meticulously painted it onto each of his weapons, even preparing a few little needles that he held in reserve. Small and often difficult to notice, attaching chakra threads to the needles and maneuvering them into striking position had won Kame a surprising number of his battles as a Sound ninja. Once done with the poison, he dismissed it and then leaned back, sighing as he realized that he still had several hours to kill before night fell.

 _Alright_ , he considered, _where to now? Orochimaru's scary, Seikaku and Sankuryu are unfriendly, and Himei's a little too friendly, so… I guess I'll go find Haku_. With that thought, he jogged off down the corridor towards the training rooms. Eventually he reached the main one, largest of the bunch, and walked in fully expecting to see Haku doing technique training. Instead, he barely registered a streak of black that was followed by slight thunk and then a quiet sigh. Further inspection revealed the sources: Seikaku was using a handheld bow and shooting at the far wall, which had several miniscule holes drilled into it.

She lowered the bow and stared at him, but with the curiosity he'd been suppressing while around Orochimaru now raging fully he ignored the look and moved over to the wall. One of the holes had an arrow's end protruding from it, and as he got even closer he saw that the hole was in a diamond shape; exactly the same size as the arrowhead's widest point. _She would've had to… no, she did hit it perfectly_ , he realized. Despite a little chink knocked out of the wall right at the entry point, the arrow was nestled deep inside its hole and Kame yanked it out to find that-

Without sound or warning, he flinched as a new arrow appeared in the hole, stumbling backwards and yelping in surprise. Kame whirled around to glare at Seikaku: "Hey, can you warn me next time you…" he stopped talking, noticing the satisfied expression on her face. She narrowed her eyes once more and then, in a blur of motion, nocked and released several more arrows that flew by Kame and found their way into the various holes with perfect accuracy. No little thunks or clacks were heard, meaning that she'd hit every single shot she'd taken down to the smallest millimeter without error.

Whatever objections he'd held died on his tongue and he opted to not push her any further, instead trotting back over to the doorway and dropping into a sitting position. Seikaku made a handsign and the arrows disappeared, then made another to summon a new arrow into being in her grasp, before nocking and launching another rapid flurry of attacks that, once again, hit their marks flawlessly. Kame only grew more and more fascinated as she did it again, and again, and again, never missing a shot until-

'Clack.' The tiny sound of metal against stone shattered the perfect silence that had reigned for the last few minutes. Once more, she'd missed the hole by a millimeter and, while the arrow had still slipped into it, an infinitesimally small notch had been carved into the stone under one of her targets. She sighed again, just like she had when Kame had first entered the room, and he felt the urge to ask: "Why are you still practicing?"

Seikaku turned to look at him with byakugan active, gazing keenly at him for several seconds before finally replying, "I'm still imperfect."

"Aren't you close enough, though?" Kame waved a hand towards the wall. "You just shot over a hundred times and only messed up twice- and even when you did mess up, you didn't even miss by anything more than a millimeter. You're practically perfect-"

An arrow whizzed by his head and he flinched once again, feeling the metal carve through his hair without actually cutting him. Seikaku lowered her bow and continued in the same quiet-yet-intense voice, "You flinched in fear despite knowing that I would not intentionally kill you, implying that you thought that I could have missed. I am still imperfect, and as long as I remain so I am unfit to wear the mantle of Third Acolyte. All it takes is a single millimeter to make the difference between salvation and damnation."

Kame's breath hitched and his eyes widened at the realization of what exactly his quiet teammate sounded like. "Are you… that sounds an awful lot like the Jashinists that I was just visiting."

Seikaku nodded. "A pity that I was otherwise disposed during the diplomatic missions, as I might have been able to convince Master to lend more aid."

"So you are…" Kame reeled a little bit. _I've been on missions with her before_ , he remembered. _I've spent a lot of time with her, but I never even thought… but then again, I never talked to her_. "Third Acolyte, huh?"

"I left that title behind, and until I achieve true faultlessness I will not answer to it. Death is art and there is only a single opportunity to make it perfect; if there is even the slightest mistake Jashin will not accept my work and I will have sentenced a soul to a terrible fate. A cursemark, Jashin's blessing, and even my byakugan are not enough to simply _give_ me the ideality of Jashin, for that boon I will gladly train as much as it takes."

Kame swallowed as he realized exactly how fervent Seikaku was. _If I'm hearing this right_ , he thought, _she left the Waterfall because she's not perfect? So her version of an artful death is the instant kill that her bow brings, and she won't let herself reassume the Third Acolyte title until she's mastered it_ … the most upsetting thing about this entire interaction for Kame was that he found himself thinking that it all made a scary sort of sense. He turned and walked away, leaving her to her training as he stepped into the other practice hall.

It was there that he found Haku and Sankuryu training together as they had for months. Both were in their earth stances, trading heavy blows at high speeds despite the rocky shells that blocked most of the damage. Neither of them were using their cursemarks and Haku hadn't opened any gates, so despite the skill evident in both members of the fight Sankuryu clearly had the upper hand. He swung out an arm that Haku ducked under, only to be met with a knee to the chin that made Kame wince, but she got up anyway and re-engaged. Another quick trade of blows ended up with a similar situation, but she rolled backwards instead of ducking and when Sankuryu pressed his advantage, she came out of the roll with a forwards tackle that landed successfully.

A quick punch to the downed Sankuryu followed, and then she hopped back and dropped back into a stance- only to stagger and lose the rocky shell, doubling over and breathing heavily. Sankuryu also dropped any combat preparedness and nodded to her, delivering some words that might be construed as praise were they not uttered in his usual emotionless tone: "You've improved, but risky tactics and flashy moves will more than likely mean death if you try them against real opponents."

Haku smiled and replied in a much more conversational tone. "Hey, you're the one who engaged against the Tsuchikage alone."

"It was necessary to the mis-"

She interrupted him. "Admit it, you wanted revenge, didn't you?"

Sankuryu stiffly straightened up and narrowed his eyes in mild annoyance. "No, I simply made a tactical decision." Haku's smile shifted from mischievous to knowing and he finally shrugged and crossed his arms. "Admittedly, I did opt to act beyond my orders and take strides to remove a possible future threat-" she shook her head, which once again had a surprisingly powerful effect on the normally stoic man. Now slightly exasperated, he relented: "I _may_ have attacked Gakutsuchi for personal reasons, but-"

Haku laughed, "Finally… it took way too long for you to just admit something that simple."

Sankuryu's mouth twitched towards a smile, which yet again shocked Kame- _I don't think I've ever seen him come close to smiling. Hell, I thought he might've been a literal puppet of Orochimaru for a while_. However, the buried-yet-undeniably-present emotion in his banter wasn't something a puppet could conjure up. "I have actual reasons for seeking vengeance against Gakutsuchi; she put the seal on me and destroyed my life."

"Gaara put the seal on me and I don't want him dead," Haku responded, still clearly enjoying the conversation more than she should. "Besides, you betrayed your village, so doesn't she kind of have a right to-"

"I also had reasons for leaving the Hidden Stone." Sankuryu's faint smile vanished, but Haku didn't seem to pick up on that detail.

"Like what?"

"The same reason your friend dragged you unconscious to Orochimaru's feet and betrayed his own village: love." Kame felt the heat of blood rushing through his face and watched Haku blush much in the same way, but listened raptly to Sankuryu's next words. "I was in love once, with a woman that was perfect for me in every way. She was from another village and when she left, I went with her. I chose love over village, but unlike your friend, I paid a heavy price for my decision. I lost my life as a shinobi, exiled from the Hidden Stone, my jutsu, sealed away from me forever, and even my love, a spy all along whose interest died with my access to the Dust Release."

Kame tried to process the new information but failed when Haku spoke back to Sankuryu in a harder tone. "Don't you _dare_ say Kame didn't sacrifice anything. He gave up his dreams for me, his entire life."

"Then prove to me that you're worth this great loss," Sankuryu said, dropping back into a basic taijutsu stance. Haku did the same, and wordlessly they clashed once more in a fluid exchange of blows that seemed more graceful and powerful than ever despite their exhaustion. Kame took a few steps back and then turned fully away, making his way back towards his room and spending the rest of his downtime pondering the new information he'd learned.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

The next morning, Kame was woken up by Grandmother at his door. He quickly finished a brief breakfast and preparations for the mission, then found his way to the primary chamber. Orochimaru delivered another speech, but Kame wasn't paying full attention; too wrapped up in nervous thoughts of the ordeal ahead to really register anything at all. Even the unpleasant yank of the Reverse Summoning Jutsu failed to pull him out of his worried concentration, and he persisted in that state long after they left on foot for the Hidden Valley


	40. Arc 4 Vol 8: Assault on the Valley

**(A/N) Two hundred thousand words down! I'm trying out a new format for the data files that might become the norm across all the chapters.**

 **Shinobi Union Registry (Active Jonin): Sutetchi**

Threat Level: A

Ninjutsu: B  
\- Notes: _Long known to use several elemental ninjutsu, more recently demonstrated teleportation._

Genjutsu: C  
\- Notes: _Never demonstrated to use genjutsu, but has escaped or dodged several of them._

Taijutsu: A  
\- Notes: _Expert swordsmanship, deadly with even minor hits, possibly in possession of Stitching Blade_

Miscellaneous Abilities: A  
\- Notes: _Can detach body parts and unleash threads, apparently invulnerable to even lethal damage._

Appearance: _Underneath black cloak typical to Hidden Waterfall ninja, wears ragged cloth like a skirt. Childlike height (~4'3"), normal build, medium-length black hair and green eyes._ _Skin is cut apart by stitching, including over face._

Attitude: _Technically legal ninja of the Hidden Waterfall, but due to that village's refusal to cooperate with the Shinobi Union, all data has been taken by other villages' ninja witnessing his field operations. Highly aggressive towards people who interfere with his missions, extraordinary loyalty to the Waterfall, and uses lethal force at any provocation whatsoever; do not engage if not strictly necessary._

History: _Family and personal history both unknown. First registered appearances start shortly after Jashinist takeover of the Hidden Waterfall. Only ever officially dispatched on missions that involved use of lethal force_.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

The Land of Rivers had more natural beauty than any place that Kame had ever seen. True to its name, it was composed of many wide canyons, ravines, and hills all separated by long rivers of clear blue water that fed the vibrant plant life. Orochimaru's base had been located at the very edge of it, so the attackers had been in for a multi-hour-long walk. _Not that I'm complaining_ , Kame admitted, _it's hard to stay nervous in this place_. With all the stunning scenery and wildlife, his nerves had gone from screaming to whispering at the edge of his consciousness.

Orochimaru, Seikaku, and Sankuryu brought up the front as per usual, Himei trailing them and making sure there were no followers, while Kame and Haku stayed in the middle. The Waterfall and Sound auxiliary forces should attack the outer borders at sunset, drawing out most (if not all) of the Hidden Valley shinobi to fight them.

They crested one of the larger mountains and stopped, looking down over the valley for which their objective was named. Almost like a horizontally compressed crater, the location for the Hidden Valley was in a wide area trapped between a ring of mountains. Kame could see the various homes, shops, and-

 _No, I can't think about that_. Kame had resigned himself to committing the terrible act that Orochimaru asked of him, destroying the entire village and everyone inside it, but the more he thought about it, the more difficult it would be to actually do the deed. For that reason, when Himei moved up between them, Kame was glad for the distraction that the middle-aged man's lazy voice provided. "Hey, Kame, can I… No, wait, Haku, can I ask you for a favor?"

"Yes." Haku didn't even ask what it was.

However, Kame wasn't quite that trusting- as kind as Himei had seemed in the past, he was still a missing-ninja and capable of great evil. "What's the favor?"

His voice must have come off more hostile than he intended, because Himei raised his hands defensively and chuckled. "Hey, it's nothing nasty, I promise. I just…" he trailed off, looking at the Hidden Valley, and then shook his head resignedly. "Look, I've been under Orochimaru for years, and this is the first time I've seen him show any fear or respect for an enemy. I think we might…" His unspoken fear hung heavy in the air.

"If you think we're going to lose, then why are you still here?" Again, Kame's voice sounded sharper and more accusatory than he'd intended it to.

"Aisuru's been sick for years, but Orochimaru's medicine is getting less and less effective. When I started to lose hope, he told me that he'd found a cure." _Aisuru must be his daughter_ , Kame realized. "This is the last mission, so if there's even the tiniest chance that I could save her, I have to take it. Sure, maybe we lose, and maybe he's lying and there is no cure, but it's at least a chance." Himei frowned and looked upwards as if he was trying to remember something. "What was I… oh, yeah. Haku, if we win this but I don't make it, can you make sure Orochimaru makes good on his promise and cures Aisuru?"

Haku started to respond but Himei immediately cut her off, "Ugh, nevermind. I'm sorry, that's not a fair responsibility to ditch on your shoulders. You can't force Orochimaru to do anything, so I guess… I don't know, I feel like I have to do everything I can to try to help 'em, you know?"

"I do." Kame's voice had finally dropped into the friendly tone he'd been trying to use for the last few minutes. "I'll do my best, but like you said, I'm not sure that I can make Orochimaru do anything he doesn't want to."

"If he won't do it, then I'll find the cure myself," Haku stated firmly. She sounded more sure about that than Kame had felt about anything for the last few months. "How can I find Aisuru?"

"She's in a small village on the coast of the Land of Hot Springs called Bichimura," Himei supplied gratefully, before raising his tone back into a more hopeful one: "But enough of this, that's all assuming I don't make it. I'm pretty sure we can do this, anyway…"

They stopped about two kilometers away from the Valley's border walls, which were constructed of cobblestone and towered at least ten meters high. Seikaku dropped into a position Kame knew all too well and summoned up her massive bow as well as her byakugan, but Orochimaru's simple "No." was enough to halt her preparations.

He turned back to the group of five ninja and spoke with a disturbing finality. "The attack will commence within the hour, and when it does, I will lead this team immediately to the Tanikage's tower and begin our attack. We've already gone over the plan of attack several times, so all of you should know the importance of your roles in the fight itself; do not get caught up in fighting a minor side battle under any circumstances. Seikaku, remain here and ensure that our path is clear."

Those words were the last ones he spoke before turning back towards the village and watching silently. As minutes dragged on, Kame could feel the mental tension returning to him in force and nervously fiddled with a kunai before realizing that it was coated in his poison and frantically returning it to his pocket. He was able to carry a good ten kunai and twenty shuriken in the various pockets of his outfit- he had two in the normal locations, but two more on the sides of his thighs and an additional two on the sides of his calves. Two on his upper arms and two more on his Sound vest carried stacks of paperbombs, sealed to prevent accidental detonations.

He moved on to his second nervous habit: taking inventory of all the aforementioned pockets' contents. _Okay_ , he thought as he opened the first one, _that's five kunai, that's another five, so we're good there. The shuriken holsters… yep, also full_. The paperbombs were harder to count, but he removed them and flipped through the stacks quickly just in case. As he'd thought, he had his typical maximum of thirty foldable paperbombs, thirty normal paperbombs, thirty windbombs, fifteen firebombs, and five smokebombs. At this point he was running out of ways to ignore the dread in his gut, but luckily another distraction presented itself in the form of Haku, smiling and sitting down beside him.

"I wonder what Miriki's doing right now," she said.

That definitely did the trick; if there was one thing that could take Kame's mind off of worrying about the future, it was regretting and getting lost in the past. _I'm sorry,_ _Miriki_ , he thought, _for everything. Hell, I never even apologized to you, did I? Four years of treating you like crap and I still haven't apologized_. "Yeah," he said shakily, "There's probably a good chance he's on a date."

"With who? Keikiro?" The names each sent bittersweet pangs through Kame's chest. Every one of them evoked happier memories, true, but also ones tainted by betrayal. "Or maybe someone new, it's been... wait, what was his record for months spent with one girlfriend?"

Haku laughed a little bit. "Wasn't it one and a half?"

"So that puts him at... what, five girlfriend cycles since we-" Kame immediately stopped himself from mentioning their last night as Sand genin, instead shifting to a new avenue: "Do you think he's used..." Kame thought for a moment, then paled in realization: "Wait, I don't think I've ever seen him attack an enemy. Have you?"

She shook her head, smile growing even more brilliant at their mutual realization. "I can't remember ever seeing him even throw a kunai. It wasn't just the chunin exams, I think Miriki graduated the academy and succeeded all those missions without every attacking a single person!"

Kame snorted, remembering the taijutsu teacher Saitama's frequent lecturing of the disinterested Kosuki. "You realize that we can't ever let him bring that up, right?"

"Oh yeah, he'd never let us hear the end of it," Haku agreed while shaking her head.

Oddly desperate to keep this conversation going for some reason, Kame grasped at another angle. "More importantly, do you think Rakuyo has given up and dated him, yet?"

He knew that he'd erred when he saw Haku's crestfallen face. _Damn_ , he thought as it dawned on him, _I shouldn't have brought up Rakuyo_. Haku responded with a tiny bit more sadness in her voice, "He can probably do better."

"Yeah, definitely," Kame agreed, anxious to escape the topic he'd mistakenly brought up as soon as possible. His shaken mental state, brought about by nerves about the impending mission and general anxiety that had grown stronger and stronger since joining Orochimaru, led him closer than ever to just confessing to her about the reasons for the change of heart that had set all of it into motion. "Look, this mission is going to be pretty dangerous, and I need to just say that... the academy graduation exam, when I-"

He faltered at the sight of her trusting eyes, searching his own for a truth that he couldn't quite bring himself to say out loud. Cursing himself for his weakness that only delayed the inevitable, he nonetheless dodged the issue once again and asked about something different. "So, how did you pass the genjutsu exam?"

Obviously not expecting _that_ particular line of questioning, Haku frowned and simply responded, "Miriki."

Kame nodded, vaguely acknowledging that Miriki had been even more undeserving of the mistreatment he'd received, and then replied more hastily than he'd meant to, eager to flee the subject. "Anyway, where do you think he's taking mystery girl number five-" _Oh, no_. Kame remembered that Miriki had been with Senshiko's team the last two times he'd seen him. _He might be in the village... if we run into him, the others might kill him_.

All of a sudden he felt sick to his stomach and paralyzed. Haku, obviously doing her own mental gymnastics, didn't push him on anything, so he was left with nothing left with nothing to think about to avoid his dilemma. _If I set that bomb_ _off_ , he thought, _then_ _I kill people... I kill Miriki_. When it had just been unnamed Valley ninja, he'd been able to ignore the true nature of what he'd be doing and just focus on Haku, but... _I don't think I can do this. If I set it off, I'm killing Miriki, but if I don't, Haku dies instead_.

The sick feeling intensified to the point where, when the sounds of battle started, he felt _grateful_ for an escape from his predicament more than anything else. Orochimaru immediately took off and the others all followed, and Kame joined the pack but kept his eyes scanning over towards the fighting. Occasional flashes and faint noises were all he could garner for a while, but as they neared the village itself he realized that the spreading battle had moved into their path. Orochimaru didn't hesitate to summon forth a massive snake and ride it forward, but Kame didn't have that option and was reduced to running forward on foot in the wake of Sankuryu, who was cutting a path of destruction through anything in his way.

Kame saw a group of the Valley ninja streaming towards them, but as a dark form flashed through them they one by one froze in place, until the one in the lead turned to see what was going on and took a blade to the stomach. Sutetchi just kept running straight into the next fight, dodging and often even just letting himself get hit by fatal attacks and shrugging them off. Another squad of Valley ninja were stabbed and seemed to be paralyzed, and then another, until all the remaining ones were in open retreat or dead. Sutetchi glanced around and spat in rage as he raised the Stitcher's Blade and drove it into his own chest, causing the long chain of still people to collapse in unison. When he spoke, it was in a disappointed voice: "I guess that's not gonna be my greatest offering to Jashin, then… _four more people_ , I almost had it!"

Kame swallowed, reminded of Hiretsuna's odd fascination with his registered kill totals, and proceeded forward through the now-decimated Valley frontlines. He himself hadn't been forced to lift a finger, yet the attackers clearly had the upper hand- the Waterfall shinobi were deadly accurate in their attacks and the Sound shinobi seemed to all have similar basic cursemarks, making both offensive forces combined a threat to be reckoned with. The sight of one of the Waterfall shinobi getting sent flying into the walled village, most likely to be ganged up on and killed, was enough to remind Kame that the Valley shinobi were also not to be underestimated.

They closed in on the border wall and several others moved to stop them, but all were engaged upon by other forces. One chunin-rank shinobi whose grey hair and eyes identified them as from Senshiko's Nagakura clan charged at Kame, and the reminder of that woman that he'd left to die froze up Kame's muscles. Before his opponent could capitalize, they collapsed mid-sprint and then started choking and vomiting blood, rolling around violently. Yodoku, the Second Acolyte, stepped over the choking ninja and smiled innocently down towards them. "You're unlucky, this one'll only take an hour to finish you off." Then turning towards the slowed-down Sound party, her smile widened. "I'm here to witness the death of the Tanikage and dedicate it to Jashin!"

Orochimaru responded while directing his snake to maul another defender, "You were supposed to engage from the north, so we could engage more stealthily!"

She simply smiled back and bit her thumb, releasing a few droplets of sickly black fluid that Kame realized was her blood, and then slammed her hands onto the ground, shouting "Summoning Jutsu!" The cloud of smoke quickly cleared to reveal the ten-foot salamander from a few days before, which she mounted and rode off after Orochimaru.

Kame followed, but soon realized why the Sannin had been so angry- their original plan had been to start a fight at the northern border, draw away all the enemies, and then engage from the south and attack the Tanikage. With the fighting spread out, their entry was noisy and obvious, so the Valley shinobi knew their intent and would collapse inwards on them. The Waterfall and Sound shinobi were never meant to win their fight, just stall it out, but if enough of the Valley ninja peeled off and engaged on the infiltration team then things would go poorly.

Orochimaru demolished the wall and kept going, and Kame lost his chance to voice those reservations as Sankuryu and Himei both disappeared into the gap in the wall. Haku hesitated, looking back towards Kame, but at his nod she also took off and he continued after his allies into the breach, only to be blocked by the appearance of a new enemy- another Nagakura, brandishing a spear that glowed with white chakra and glaring at him.

Kame activated his cursemark's first stage and took stock of the full situation: besides him and the Nagakura, the battlefield was clear of other- _No, there's three smaller ones approaching_ … his battle planning fell apart as two twelve-year-old academy students appeared behind the Nagakura man, cheering from atop the wall: "Go, Ji-sensei!" "Stop the bad guy, Ji-sensei!"

 _I can't… I can't do it_ , Kame realized. His hand refused to draw the paperbombs that would harm the children or their teacher right before their eyes, and he stumbled backwards as Ji began to charge. _If we lose this fight, I die… Haku dies_ … the thought of his only real ally getting hurt was once again the only thing managing to spur him into action, and he folded and threw a small paper airplane. The plane went forward and up into a loop, which gave him time to ready chakra in _both_ of his hands and gauge the distance between himself and the enemy.

The gap was closed rapidly, but Kame steeled his nerves and let the Nagakura get as close as he dared before rolling _forwards_ and throwing up a hand: "Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu!" the blast of wind shoved him into the ground _hard_ but launched both the Nagakura and the little airplane skyward. Kame used his now-free hand to make a release symbol, causing the airplane to release the log stored inside it, and then substituted to the log and found himself above the mid-air enemy. The other hand that had still been gathering chakra was now thrust forward and he released it in an even larger burst: "Wind Style: Hurricane Force Jutsu!"

The chunin was sent flying downwards towards the ground and slammed into it, stunned just long enough for Kame to make one final sign and detonate the paperbombs that he'd plastered to the log beforehand and catch the man in the explosion. _Okay_ , Kame thought analytically, _he's either dead or injured badly, so I can take most of my attention off of him_. His chakra senses noticed that the two children were still there, but when he turned towards them they both yelled angrily and charged.

"Fire Style-" he cut himself off before unleashing the deadly jutsu, unwilling to go that extra step and kill the two kids with his own hands. Instead he feigned left and then darted to the right, directly avoiding them and moving off through the gap. _You're going to kill them anyway when you blow that bomb_ , the cynical voice in his head said, but he silenced it and went on in denial just a little bit longer.

Through the hole, he saw the trail of destruction that Orochimaru had left, but in jumping up to the rooftops he noticed something else- another fight. Approaching stealthily, he peeked over the edge to the sight of a few Valley chunin surrounding the Waterfall ninja from earlier who'd been launched into the village. The Waterfall ninja in question glanced around at the impossible odds and then began cackling wildly, ripping off her black cloak and pulling out a vial of red liquid. Kame leaned forward as he saw the woman down the vial's contents, which looked eerily similar to the red-stained water created by the execution he'd watched. She screamed in pain as every vein and artery in her body seemed to pulse dark-red and her skin turned the same color, while a red aura that wasn't chakra materialized around her.

"Witness me, Jashin!" she shouted, and then disappeared with so much speed and power that the ground around her feet shattered into a crater. The blur of red and black that she's become left behind a red trail, probably the only thing that enabled Kame to even barely track her movements. The six or seven chunin stood absolutely no chance and were all mutilated by inhumanly strong blows in the space of a few seconds, and then the woman took off down a street. Kame watched with morbid curiosity as she made it all the way down the street in the space of ten seconds and nearly crossed the entire village, but then disappeared in an explosion of red and black that sent waves of tainted chakra far enough for even Kame to sense them. When the chakra, smoke, and gore cleared away, there was nothing left of her but a bloodstain.

Kame tore his eyes off of the twisted sight and kept moving after Orochimaru and the others, noting the odd Valley corpse or two that were spread around in the snake's wake. The Takikage's tower was a round and fortress-like bastion of stone that shot up nearly thirty meters into the sky, and given the spread-out nature of the Valley, it was still a good distance away from him. He started out in a run but froze and turned as he sensed massive power surges coming from behind him.

A slow turn brought his eyes to bear on the sources: the scattered still-living members of the Nagakura clan activating the jutsu that had enabled Senshiko to take on a tailed beast. The moon, now shining brightly with the absence of the sun, sent down countless pillars of light and chakra that scattered around the battlefield. _That's bad_ , Kame thought, then noticed that the moon was not only out but also full. _That's really, really bad. How did we not think this through…_

The battle resumed, but it was now dotted with sporadic bursts of brightness flashing through the ambient glow. Kame was transfixed by the fighting, and grew even more sucked in when responsive bursts or red and black intermixed- both sides using their ultimate techniques and laying into each other. Finally, he managed to rip his eyes off of it and turn back to the mission at hand, taking off across the rooftops at a moderate pace. For a long time there as little to no resistance as he neared the final objective, but his luck couldn't last forever; at a distance of about a single kilometer out from the tower, he ran into a squad of Valley genin.

"Hey, this guy's our age!" one of them called out, pointing at Kame, and they encircled him carefully.

Another one of the six genin drew a kunai. "Sensei didn't say anything about running away from another genin." More and more of the group readied into combat

That moment of moral hesitation that he could never fully eradicate came upon him once again, but when the various shinobi all drew weapons and made handsigns, he got over the fact that they were around his own age. _Maybe a little younger_ , he considered, _I'm fifteen and I don't think I look quite that childish_. He ran through some handsigns while dodging two thrown kunai and then leaned forward, breathing down towards his own feet while shouting, "Fire Style: Burning Ash Jutsu!"

A caustic cloud of black gunpowder smoke billowed out and surrounded him, causing the next few kunai to miss and clatter into the ground. Kame smiled and whipped out two paperbombs from opposite shoulders, rapidly folding one of them while dropping the other one and then launching the complete airplane and jumping straight up.

One handsign detonated the one he'd dropped to the ground, blowing the smoke cloud and airplane both outwards as well as launching him up into the air. The genin were caught in the rushing smoke and when Kame detonated the firebomb airplane, all of them were caught in the massive explosion. _That… that shouldn't have killed them_ , he reassured himself. _The smoke was spread out, so they're probably only injured_.

"Wind Style: Wind Cushion Jutsu!" The swirling air slowed his fall and he landed in a walking stride, moving towards the Tanikage's tower. He sped up when he heard the massive crash and saw Orochimaru's huge snake slamming into the tower's side, making it over to the brewing confrontation in a matter of seconds. The snake (and presumably some additional attacks from the other Sound ninja) broke the tower more and more until it crumbled away and fell to the ground in a heap of broken stone.

That pile of rubble settled just long enough for Kame to question what would happen next, but then exploded with white energy that send fragments of stone flying in all directions. In the middle of an untouched patch of the ground stood the Tanikage, white robes floating slightly from sheer chakra and eyes glowing too bright to look at through his facemask. "Orochimaru," he said in the same superior tone he'd sentenced Haku to die with.

"Tanikage," Orochimaru hissed with a vicious sneer.

"The last time I saw you, you were slithering away into the ruins of your pathetic excuse for a village."

Orochimaru's face went from dismissive to hateful and he lowered himself slightly, bending his arms up at the elbows and releasing a monstrous amount of killing intent and chakra that dwarfed the Tanikage's. "I thought I'd return the favor," he said through gritted teeth, "But unlike you, I'm going to finish the job."

"It was foolish of you to come here," the Tanikage said, voice still clearly contemptuous. "It was even more foolish to think that enlisting the aid of three children and two sad excuses for ninja would be enough to defeat me." The white-robed man finally dropped into a stance, kicking back one leg and reaching to the sides with his arms, and then Kame winced and staggered backwards from sheer sensory overload as the Tanikage's chakra exploded to a level that he'd had never seen before- greater than Orochimaru's, greater than a tailed beast's, it was powerful enough to make all of the Sound shinobi to take a step backwards out of fear, save Orochimaru. "But you came here anyway. For that mistake, you will pay with your life and the Sound village will fade away into a distant memory."


	41. Arc 4 Vol 9: Takedown

**(A/N) Sorry for _three_ consecutive cliffhanger chapter endings...**

 **Shinobi Union Registry (Active Jonin): Yodoku**

Threat Level: A

Ninjutsu: A  
\- Notes: _Highly deadly mastery over poison in both liquid and gas form. First known ninja after Hanzo to hold contract with the Salamanders_

Genjutsu: A  
\- Notes: _Shown ability to apply various_ _genjutsu through poisons to a wide range of effects_

Taijutsu: C  
\- Notes: _Seems to avoid melee combat and weaponry in general_

Miscellaneous Abilities: B  
\- Notes: _Uncorroborated reports indicate possible immortality and poisoned blood._

Appearance: _Childlike height (~4'1"), thin build, appearance of a pale young girl age 9-10 with medium-length blond hair and black eyes. Never seen outside of child-size Hidden Waterfall cloak, but often noted to be riding a salamander summon. Unconfirmed reports indicate her blood may be black._

Attitude: _Seems like a remarkably intelligent but otherwise normal little girl on the surface, but underneath is reportedly just as religiously fanatical as the rest of her village. Also like the others of her village, her data was not delivered to the union, so all information is based on field reports of other villages' ninja. Most reports outline a sadistic personality type that not only enjoys but also takes religious dedication in slow deaths involving poison, so do not engage without support._

History: _Family/Personal history both unknown, but bears striking similarities to Hanzo of the Salamander both physically and in her abilities. This theory is also supported by the first known appearances of her as a rogue ninja operating in the Land of Rain. Disappeared after the Great Rebuilding, presumed dead, and then reappeared as an active and high-ranking ninja of the Hidden Waterfall. Ever since, has demonstrated incredibly effectiveness (if not efficiency) in any and all missions she takes, all of which involve killing._

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Despite the Tanikage's threatening proclamation, it was Orochimaru who initiated combat by flattening himself to the ground and opening his fanged mouth impossibly wide: "Ten Thousand Snakes Wave!" It was good that he was at the front of the Sound group, because a huge wave of snakes emerged from his mouth and poured over everything before him, coming straight towards the still unmoving Tanikage.

The still, white-robed man wasn't even forced to move at all, because two new fighters entered the battlefield in a blur. One of them landed on the ground and raised his hands towards the sky, before shouting "Radiant Purge!" and making a motion as if he was pulling something down out of the air towards the incoming snakes. From the direction he'd pulled, the moonlight seemed to intensify and shine stronger and stronger over the area, starting to actually grow painful-

The Sound ninja all dodged out of it mere seconds before it flashed unbelievably bright and then vanished, leaving the fifteen-meter circle on the ground that it had hit seared and smoking. The snakes had all been reduced to ashes in an instant by the newcomer's jutsu, bringing about a brief pause as both sides gauged their new situations.

Kame took the opportunity to study both challengers. The one that had roasted the snakes was a tall man clad in a Valley jonin's vest, with a head of shockingly messy grey hair and slightly glowing grey eyes. The other was a middle-aged woman, also a jonin, with the same brown hair and blue eyes as Gunaji. She was standing atop the recently created rubble pile, laying her hands upon it and building up chakra rather than engaging in the standoff. Kame took after her example and began folding paper in his hands, preparing for the eventual clash.

"Your evil ways end here, Orochimaru." The Nagakura dropped into a taijutsu stance, and the moonlight chakra poured out of him into a psuedo-tailed beast cloak. _It's not just the hair and eyes_ , Kame noted, _this guy's even got the same righteous, serious voice as Senshiko. Is it a Nagakura thing?_

"Get off your high horse, Boei," the woman said in a _much_ more conversational tone of voice. "If you don't start taking this seriously…"

"Really!?" The man straightened up, cloak of light still active, and actually turned his back on the Sound force to speak to the woman, seriousness now replaced with argumentativeness. "Really, Sugeko? Every time I'm trying to deliver justice, you interrupt me with some whining. Every. Single. Time."

"Ha! You call that unnecessary, self-fellating performance 'delivering justice!?"

At this point, as they bickered like an old married couple, Kame wondered why none of the other Sound ninja had attacked yet. The man, Boei, was a perfect target; back to the enemy, hands on his hips, and tapping his foot impatiently. "It's necessary to strike fear into the hearts of-"

Sugeko responded with a childish squealing parody of his words. "'It'S nEceSsaRY To StRike fEaR'- oh, shut up. Can you even hear yourself talk, you egotistical idiot? You aren't half as cool as you think you are."

Boei gasped. "You take that back."

"No."

"Stubborn cow. This is why I divorced you."

That wiped the smirk off of Sugeko's face as she gasped in outrage. In an instant, she was giving Boei a death glare and shouting, " _I_ divorced _you_ , you bastard! What planet are you occupying if you think that-"

Then three shadow clones of Orochimaru rose up from the ground and surrounded the Tanikage and his two guards. All four of the Orochimarus… _Orochimari? Whatever…_ all of them made handsigns and then smiled as they thrust open palms forward. "Fire Style: Great Fireball Jutsu!"

Four massive gouts of flame incinerated the area, hiding the Tanikage and Valley jonin within a raging inferno. Not allowing himself to even hope that the sneak attack had ended the battle, Kame darted backwards and readied himself for the next engagement; which ended up coming sooner rather than later as the fire finally faded away to reveal a superheated dome of stone that crumbled back into the dust and revealed two unharmed Valley ninja.

The third's presence became known to a confused Kame when the crumbled rocks shifted around and piled atop each other, fitting together and building up to a massive form. When the last of the fragments that had once been the Tanikage's tower slid into place, the newly formed humanoid began to take long steps towards the Sound ninja. A crude mouth and eyes formed on the head, made out of glowing blue chakra, and then Kame didn't have any more time to gawk because a fifteen-meter-high rock titan was slamming a massive fist into the ground mere feet away from him.

Just the shockwave was enough to launch him away from the impact, and even as he tumbled through the air he was forced to plan and go on the defensive. The golem was striding towards him and Sankuryu was chasing after it, but the other assorted ninja were all engaging on each other. With each backpedaling step Kame took, he and his huge opponent moved further and further away from their respective allies.

With much longer legs, the golem (that he assumed was Sugeko's, given his knowledge of the Kokusekis' affinity for rocks) ate up the distance between them and brought its fist thundering down towards him. In the second or so before it hit, he dropped a paperbomb while scanning for… _yep, there we go_ , he thought as he reached out towards the promising piece of wood and cast one of his two most familiar jutsu: "Substitution!"

The good news was that the substitution bought Kame a few more valuable seconds and allowed Sankuryu to catch up. The bad news was that the broken wooden building fragment was shattered irreparably, and Kame didn't see any more viable targets for substitutions. Sugeko's creation turned towards him and swing a fist down, but even as it struck the ground hard enough to shatter it and leave behind a crater, Sankuryu's completely unfazed face poke out. The rest of him followed as he simply strode away right through the stone that should have squashed him to a pulp, dust stance causing everything that touched him to disintegrate.

The rock monster figured that fact out very quickly and took a step or two backwards as it touched the broken limb to a shop's stone wall, breaking the structure down and rebuilding itself with the materials. All of a sudden, Sugeko's voice came shouting from the glowing mouth: "Earth Style: Earthquake!"

A powerful tremor knocked Kame and Sankuryu both off of their feet, but while Kame landed and quickly got back up, Sankuryu cried out in pain as a rocky spike punched through his shoulder. _What? But he…_ Kame quickly realized what had happened- somehow, Sugeko retained control over the rocks that had broken off during her failed attack and had formed them into a spike. When the ground had shaken and Sankuryu had fallen, he'd removed the dust stance from his back in order to avoid falling deep into the earth- and taken a spike through his upper arm.

Sugeko's stone creature took the opportunity to charge Kame, and with Sankuryu incapacitated for the moment he was forced to do his best to survive alone. He took off towards the shattered wooden fragments of his substitution log, folding an airplane and gathering chakra. Upon making it to the substitution log with a stone fist only meters away, he released the chakra: "Wind Style: Hurricane Force Jutsu!" and went flying off towards the buildings of downtown.

The fist crashed into the ground once again, but this time Kame was prepared and had already left a paperbomb there earlier. A quick handsign detonated the bomb… to no effect. A pathetic muffled thump and puff of smoke were the only signs that it had even gone off, and when the monster raised its hand, it was completely unharmed. He noticed Sankuryu start to move and released the airplane towards him while climbing up onto the rooftops and thinking through how he could possibly survive this fight.

He narrowed his eyes at a new development- for some reason, Sugeko seemed unwilling to send the gargantuan stone body into the fragile city. Kame recognized why when he heard a childish whimper underneath himself, followed by shushing- _the city still has people in it_ , he realized with no small amount of horror. _There's_ -

 _No_. He stifled his abused sense of morality like he had countless times in the months prior, ruthlessly cutting off any more indecisive thoughts without the gentleness he was able to when not in combat. Refocusing on the battle at hand, he dropped down into the road between the buildings and began to fold and throw paperbombs one after the other, harassing his much larger opponent with repeated explosions.

The blasts may have been far too weak too do much more than distract the huge thing, but then again- a distraction was all Kam needed. Sankuryu, who'd received Kame's paperbomb, read the single word Kame had scrawled on it, and then approached gradually, leaped up and tilted himself backwards with the paperbomb attached to the small of his back. Using his chakra senses rather than his eyes, Kame gauged the angle and distance between the three moving parts: the slowly-turning giant, the empty void of Sankuryu, and the tiny speck of chakra that was the paperbomb. At the moment where the three aligned correctly, he made the sign to detonate the paperbomb.

The resulting blast of wind chakra sent Sankuryu flying forward straight though the stone giant, bisecting it at the waist and punching out with the second stage of his cursemark active. As the mantis-like Sound ninja stabbed one long claw into the side of a building and hung there, the two halves of Sugeko's golem dropped to the earth and Kame allowed himself a relieved sigh.

However, that he didn't even get to finish it before his chakra sense revealed something highly alarming- Sugeko's chakra signature wasn't fading from the stones. In fact, it remained just as strong and even flared up as the two halves of the golem broke even further down into component stones that all, for some reason, _still_ contained Sugeko's chakra. Sankuryu swore in anger as the individual rocks all rose up and began to reform back into a humanoid, and Kame glanced at his comrade- blood was running freely down the Sound Ninja Four member's right side, arm and chest, and he seemed to hang weakly.

"I can handle this, please go help Haku," Kame said. In part, his statement was true- he _was_ worried about Haku. Of course, the confidence in his own victory was nearly all false, but he knew that Sankuryu would be more hindrance than help in the circumstances. That split-second judgement that he'd been so sure of started to come into doubt in his mind, but by then Sankuryu had already wordlessly moved off towards the main fighting and it was too late for Kame to retain his ally.

Sugeko- and it _was_ Sugeko, Kame realized, as all of Sugeko's chakra was present in the construct- made a move to go after Sankuryu, but Kame drew her attention back to himself as he dropped a paperbomb onto the roof below him. "Hey! Your fight is with me," he said, wincing at how unimpressive he sounded, "And if you go after him then your precious city pays the price." _Oh god_ , he realized, _when it comes down to it, I really am capable of hurting innocent civilians to save my own skin. I can't believe_ -

A rocky blow came tearing at just above the roof's level, threatening to crush Kame and forcing personal thoughts out of his mind. He carefully judged the distance and, at the last second, jumped _over_ the incoming attack; only to see the other hand coming towards him in mid-air. "Wind Style: Wind Cushion Jutsu!" The minor push was enough to lift him another few feet, now level with the golem's head and avoiding both of its hands. Again, "Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu!" sent him flying past the edge of the roof and towards the actual ground, and one more Wind Cushion Jutsu allowed him to touch down gently.

He still sensed the huge mass of chakra, but wasn't _too_ worried, as the road was too thin to accommodate the titanic stone monster. Unfortunately, Sugeko's chakra did exactly what he thought it couldn't and came right through the street towards him, much faster than before. He whipped around and saw the rocks, no longer organized in any recognizable shape, tearing up the paved road and destroying anything else in their path on their route towards him. _Shit, shit, shit, shit_ -

In contrast to his emotional panic, the rational side of his mind ran through the 'Oh, shit.' mental checklist: Substitution targets? _Nothing in sight_. Prepared paperbombs? _None._ Gale Force Jutsu? _Not enough time_. With only one second left before getting mutilated by the hailstorm of stones, he activated his cursemark's second stage, desperately released freeform chakra in front of himself and applied a wind change of nature to push himself backwards, and used another huge amount of chakra to rip off a chunk off of the building above him and substitute with it.

In total, he spent probably a fifth of his cursemark chakra, which wasn't good given the fact that before activating second stage his personal chakra had also been depleted considerably. Granted, extensive training with the cursemark had removed most of the negative side effects, but that didn't change the fact that once it ran out, he was back to whatever meager stores he'd held before initially activating it. _I have to finish this quickly_ , he thought as he ran some more chakra through his legs and moved back down to the street.

Sugeko's wild storm of chakra and stone slowed rapidly and started to move back towards him in a way that almost seemed clumsy. _Okay_ , Kame decided, _time to finish this_. He ran through a mental list of everything he knew about her and her jutsu- it was probably an advanced form of Gunaji's rudimentary Stone Bond kekkeigenkai, allowing her to meld with and control much more rock than her genin relative. Kame knew from conversations with the younger Kokuseki and later from fighting him the limitations and rules of their power- they merged with the rocks, splitting them up and moving them around at will. It took little to no chakra, but… _what was it that Gunaji said? I asked him why he only used three rocks at a time for the most part, and he said that trying to handle too much was dangerous_.

One final thing clicked into place for Kame, and even as he retreated from the accelerating stone barrage his mind raced faster than his feet in formulation of a way to win. _I can't completely destroy the rocks, so I guess I have to force her to leave them…_ Orochimaru's warning about the danger of the Dance of the Shikigami, mixed with the bits and pieces he'd been able to drag out of Gunaji (who was hard-pressed to reveal any weakness of his kekkeigenkai), finally came together into a rough plan of attack. _I have to make the rocks into too much for her to deal with_.

It was then that Sugeko re-achieved her initial speed, going from slowly gaining on Kame to blitzing towards him. He frantically sped up his own motions, throwing out two different handfuls of paperbombs and securing one of the groups with chakra threads. The ones that he hadn't grabbed disappeared into Sugeko's gnashing hurricane, but he kept taking out more of them and dropping them after their fellows. He held the other handful mostly behind him using the chakra threads that he'd attached to them, bringing them in front of him one after another and detonating them. They were weakened windbombs, so they did absolutely nothing to slow or stop the incoming one-to-five-foot-thick rocks, but they _did_ help to accelerate him away from the dangerous assault in a barely-under-control manner.

For an awkwardly long time they continued in that way, Kame narrowly avoiding great injury by blasting himself away from it over and over while frantically emptying his pockets of regular paperbombs and letting them flutter off into the vicious storm of rocks. When he had only a single one left, he turned and went off in a beeline towards the original battleground and out of the city. _Oh, crap_ , he thought, realizing that he didn't have enough weakened windbombs left to keep him moving all the way to his target destination.

He used the last one with twenty meters left to go, sprinting as fast as his cursemark-enhanced legs could carry him and inputting the minimum amount of chakra that would put the paperbomb in his hands on a three-second timer before tossing it into the air behind him. Fifteen meters left… ten… he heard and _felt_ the explosion behind him scatter the frontrunner rocks… five meters… and he dove forward out of the city into a roll that brought him back up facing Sugeko.

The Valley jonin, after having her loose rocks knocked back slightly by Kame's paperbomb, seemed all too eager to take full advantage of their return to the wide-open battlefield. The rocks swirled together and began to reform into the stone titan, once again packed densely enough to essentially ignore his paperbombs' weak explosions. The outer shell of stone was tough, far too tough for him to break with a barrage of bombs.

Luckily, Kame had other ideas. He looked up into the now-complete giant of solid rock, raised his comparatively tiny hand, braced himself, and then made the detonation sign.

All the handfuls of paperbombs that he'd dropped, that had been swallowed up by the whirling Sugeko's hungry maw, had one last trick in store: they were _normal_ paperbombs. Rather than being made for folding or getting tied to kunai, every single one of those scraps of paper had been created by Kame with the attachment seal that adhered to the first surface it met almost magnetically. The tiny bombs had disappeared into the storm of rocks, and while some had been caught on edges and destroyed or left behind on the road, most of them had come close enough to at least one of the rocks to stick and remained flatly plastered on even now.

As tough as Sugeko's outer shell might have been, the combined explosions of nearly thirty paperbombs within every little crack and crevice of her body was too much for almost anything to survive. Even worse, she'd rebuilt herself, which meant that all of the rocks bore the brunt of the chained explosions and not just the ones with bombs attached. Kame was knocked flat on his back with a blast of heat flaring against his face, vision filled with nothing but orange flame and smoke and then nothingness.

When he finally stood, all that was left of Sugeko's stone giant was a scattered field of little fragments. He picked his way carefully over the blast marks, soot, and scorched pebbles, some still red with heat, and finally reached the epicenter of the desolation. Lying there in the middle of a crater was Sugeko, visibly unharmed but also out cold with her eyes rolled back into her head and her limbs unmoving. His chakra senses told him why; in the massive blast her chakra had gone from being split between fifty or so rocks and several hundred. She'd suffered the same fate as a genin would if they attempted the Shadow Clone jutsu, become overextended both mentally and spiritually, and it had taken a heavy toll.

Kame, who still had a good half of his cursemark chakra and regular chakra left, approached with a kunai in hand and held it to her throat. _It'd be so easy to just…_ but the blade wouldn't budge. It quivered there, inches away from a lethal cut but refusing to move because his arm wasn't obeying him. In the end, he yanked it away and made a shallow cut to her arm, trusting the poison to keep her immobilized if she recovered in the near future.

He approached the still-raging battle, cutting a wide path around the fight against the Tanikage as blasts of chakra narrowly missed Orochimaru and cut deep gouges into the earth. Yodoku, Himei, and Orochimaru appeared to have the upper hand, but Kame didn't join them; instead moving all the way around the fighting and towards the other battle going on at the moment.

When he got within sight he wished he'd hurried a bit faster, because the circumstances were dire. Boei's chakra was even greater than Senshiko's and he was keeping up with, if not exceeding, Haku's speed. Sankuryu was unconscious, but Haku was keeping the Valley jonin from killing him, and Kame moved forward to try to help the situation but immediately stopped as a familiar presence suddenly felt like it was crushing down on him. As Boei unleashed a particularly vicious strike into Haku, discharging enough sheer chakra to knock her flying backwards, Kame actually flinched as he realized what was going on, yet was unable to stop it.

He could only watch as Boei thrust an open palm forwards, unleashing a wide beam of pure moonlight chakra that seared away the ground and reached Haku in the blink of an eye. When it got there, though, it slowed in a way that Kame knew all too well and swirled inwards towards Haku's hands. _No, she can't_ , Kame remembered, _if she uses the kekkeigenkai, then…_

Her eyes, now containing the black spirals that indicated she'd activated her kekkeigenkai, flashed towards her opponent with an uncharacteristic amount of bloodlust. For his part, Boei appeared to be completely confused as to what was going on, but he soon lost the chance to worry about it any more as Haku tore forwards with what Kame recognized as third breath strength and launched a devastating flurry of blows. Boei managed to avoid all of the strikes, but their wind pressure alone flung him backwards and before he could recover, Haku was on him once again, this time spinning in the air above him and then slamming a leg into his midsection.

At the point of contact, for the briefest moment his chakra was visibly being drained away into her, but then he was launched towards the ground and crashed into the dirt hard enough cause a small crater. Haku dropped to the ground in a feral crouch, then stalked over to him and slammed a hand against his chest, restarting the chakra absorption from before. Kame watched, still frozen with paralytic horror, as more and more of the blue and white chakra was simply ripped from his body and disappeared into Haku's hand, swirling away like water down a drain until the flow just… stopped.

Kame's didn't need any enhanced senses to tell that Boei was dead; his basic eyes were enough to see that the rise and fall of the man's chest had stopped and his eyes had glazed over. _Haku killed another person_ , he thought with mild panic and rapidly shortening breath. The oppressive presence of the tentails hanging heavily in the air and the way she'd casually drained an innocent Valley ninja to death compounded the mental turmoil Kame had been in since he'd found out that he'd have to destroy an entire village, and all he could do was look towards her helplessly until she _looked towards him_.

His downwards spiral stopped immediately when Haku's spiralling eyes met his. In an instant, she crossed the distance between them and stood before him with a purple glow starting to form over her, and his sixth sense was screaming at him just how evil it was- the missing-ninja; the sixtails; hell, even Orochimaru's killing intent and chakra had still felt like naturally existing things, but this… this was something else entirely. It was pure evil, the sort that would never be reasoned with and didn't have any motivation other than to consume and destroy until there was nothing left to consume and destroy. Just sitting there before the horror that Haku held inside her was enough to push his mind to the very brink-

"Kame?" Her voice was like a lifeline, because the fear and desperation present in it were like anathema to the intimidation of the tentails. The simple thought of ' _Haku needs me'_ was all that it took to break the spell- the tentails' horrifying existence was still there, but he was able to ignore it because the one thing he'd truly cared about in his life for the last seven months needed his help.

"Haku, how can I…?" he trailed off as she dropped to her knees, staring straight at him with eyes full of fear that gradually transformed into determination.

She set her jaw and dropped her gaze, on her hands and knees now, making quiet gasps and pants of effort as the relentlessly marching emergence of the tentails halted… and then began to retreat. Out of instinct, Kame dropped to his knees as well and laid a hand on her shoulder, surprised at how… normal it felt, as the purple chakra receded inch by hard-fought inch back inside her. With one last strained breath, Haku managed to wipe away any traces of the tentails from Kame's chakra senses, and still somehow had the strength to stand up.

He rose along with her, biting his lip nervously and no more sure of what to say than he'd been on that escort mission so long ago, when she'd first killed an enemy. She began to move in the direction of the last fight, the one against the Tanikage, and Kame wordlessly followed her.

When they arrived, it was already almost over. The Tanikage had yet to move from his defensive position in the rubble of his tower, and while there were ample blast marks and devastated troughs of earth that his chakra attacks had gouged away, Orochimaru, Yodoku, and Himei remained alive.

Kame didn't end up getting to do anything, as Yodoku tossed a spinning umbrella into the air that quickly began showering the Tanikage's area with needles. The Tanikage raised a hand and a small white form rose up and spread itself until it became a round, one-meter diameter shield just over his head, sheltering him from the hail of sharp metal. He threw out another hand and another little white ball became shield number two, upon which a black arrow exploded into fragments mere inches away from hitting him. Orochimaru darted forward, shouting "Striking Shadow Snakes!" and two snakes emerged from his sleeves, only to meet with a third white shield.

However, when Himei swooped down from the sky and unleashed a visible wave of distorted air and sound towards him, the Tanikage was hemmed in on all sides by his own shields and took the attack head-on. He stumbled and the shields fell away just long enough for Orochimaru to dart forward and place two hands against his shoulders: "Forbidden Sealing: Apathy Shell!"

The Tanikage slumped over onto his knees, arms limp at his sides, with Orochimaru standing behind him and retaining his grasp on his shoulders. When the white-robed man spoke, it was in an emotionless yet under the surface heavily strained voice: "What… is… this?"

"My vengeance," Orochimaru answered with savage glee. "Kame, come now and bring out the sixtails bomb." Kame did as he was asked, removing another storage card and releasing the larger sheet of paper within which was held the chakra of the sixtails. "Now, Tanikage, you're going to watch your village and all your underlings, the people who trusted you to protect them, melted away right before your eyes."

"No…" the Tanikage all but whispered, eyes widening in pain and horror.

"Yes…" Orochimaru turned towards Kame. "Detonate it."

The bomb had an epicenter that would keep all the Sound shinobi caught in the blast safe, a small radius that wouldn't be destroyed when it went off. However, Kame realized that some people _would_ and turned towards Yodoku: "All the Waterfall-"

"Death in the name of Jashin is infinitely preferable to life in this accursed world," Yodoku crowed.

Kame laid the paper down and put his hands in the top two corners, fully ready to discharge his chakra and set it off. One little push, and it would be done- Haku would be safe fro another day, and the Tanikage would see… would…

The pain and fear in the Tanikage's eyes in that moment was utterly incongruous with the image of a heartless killer that Orochimaru had painted. In that moment, all the lies that Orochimaru had fed Kame melted away like snow in the face of a dazzlingly bright and warm truth. Those were not the eyes of a man who had slaughtered countless villages, they were the eyes of a man who was about to lose everything he cared about, and Kame couldn't meet them any longer, instead choosing to desperately close his own.

"Kame, do it!" Orochimaru's voice held a hint of stress in it now, and the hands that were locked on the Tanikage's shoulders shuddered with effort.

However, after cutting off his vision Kame was lost, because in his mind's eye he saw the chunin that had attacked him earlier, and the two little children who'd come to support and even try to save their teacher. All the Valley ninja, simply fighting to protect what they cared about, just like Kame was for Haku, and all the civilians who couldn't even fight at all. All they could do was hope.

 _Hope_.

Kame hadn't had hope for a long time. For more than half a year now, in fact, he'd been living with nothing but resentment for what the future would likely hold for him. He'd worried, planned, and ignored it, yet somewhere along the way he'd forgotten how to just have faith in it. In Haku's future, and in his own.

So rather than detonating the bomb and destroying a village full of innocents just to buy himself and Haku another few weeks of awful living, he did perhaps the most foolish thing he'd ever done in his life and ripped the sixtails bomb in two. Without even a bang or a sizzle, the chakra simply ceased to exist, going off to wherever tailed beasts went while they reformed, and Kame was left kneeling within a circle of Sound ninja wearing expressions of varyingly intense disbelief.

And gazing directly at him was the Tanikage with equal disbelief in his eyes, but underneath it lay a new and powerful hope that rivaled Kame's own.


	42. Arc 4 Vol 10: The Tanikage's Wrath

**(A/N) I'm making an effort in this story to avoid _directly_ contradicting canon and building on the stuff that Kishimoto left behind, so if you see anything that I missed that isn't reconcilable with the canon Narutoverse then feel free to leave a review telling me.**

 **In addition, given that fans had to use deductive reasoning to get to some of them, here's a list of** **_all_ of the combined-nature-release Kekkeigenkai, most of which are confirmed or logically inferrable from canon: Magnet (Earth+Wind), Lava (Earth+Fire), Wood (Earth+Water), Explosion (Earth+Lightning), Scorch (Wind+Fire), Ice (Wind+Water), Gravity (Wind+Lightning), Boil (Fire+Water), Spark (Fire+Lightning), and Storm (Water+Lightning).**

 **Gravity and Spark are the only two on the list that I filled in myself, and they're fairly self-explanatory. I won't go into too much detail on them unless they come up in the story.**

 **There's only one Kekkei Tota in Naruto canon, and while I don't plan to go bonkers handing new ones out, I am going to explore how a few more triple chakra-nature combinations would play out. So far, the only mentioned new one is Plasma Style (Fire+Water+Lightning).**

 **Shinobi Union Registry (Deceased Jonin):** **Migaku Kotashinsei**

Threat Level: C

Ninjutsu: A  
\- Notes: _Able to use several nature changes, m_ _aster of transportation and summoning jutsu_

Genjutsu: B  
\- Notes: _Typical jonin-level grasp of genjutsu; definitely not anything noteworthy_

Taijutsu: C  
\- Notes: _Weak in taijutsu since youth_ _, but old age compounds her physical weaknesses_

Miscellaneous Abilities: D  
\- Notes: _Incredible mastery over sealing, storage, and utility jutsu._

Appearance: _Short height (4'7"), frail build, stooped posture and murky grey hair/eyes due to age. Moves with purpose and dexterity but lacks energeticness, typically wears plain robes underneath Hidden Sound vest._

Attitude: _Compassionate and loyal to her village, but also willing to help others who need it. Shows an odd amount of attachment to younger ninja under her care. Never known to kill even when strictly necessary, preferring to use incapacitating methods instead. Most typically found on benign or support missions to help civilians in need._

History: _Comes from obscure family, lost parents in Fourth Shinobi World War and sought out life as a shinobi afterwards. Began training in the reformed Hidden Sound in her twenties, far older than most, but succeeded in learning the way of the ninja except for the ruthlessness. Skipped genin and was promoted to chunin and then jonin by Orochimaru, during which time she continued to excel as a shinobi. Started a family of other Sound ninja, after which she began to spend less and less time engaging on missions and more and more time on family. Eventually presumed dead when Orochimaru destroyed the Hidden Sound, although the bodies of her family members were found and hers was not, indicating possible complications._

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

In all honesty, the slow but quickly intensifying laughter of the Tanikage was most likely the only thing that saved Kame's life. Himei, Haku, Yodoku, and even Orochimaru's incredulous stares were broken one after another to refocus on the Tanikage, whose voice had lost almost all strain and was just laughing away. His initial chuckle rapidly grew in strength and intensity until he was almost hysterical, high-strung and cracking up like he'd just seen the funniest thing in his life.

Of course, even that oddity couldn't distract the other Sound ninja from Kame for long, and soon Orochimaru's accusatory eyes turned back to him and promised a bloody, violent death. However, once again the Tanikage took back everyone's attention by seemingly stifling his laughter and sobering up enough to choke out some speech: "You… you didn't kill the village…"

"You shouldn't be so amused," Orochimaru snapped. "You're dying right here and you can go to your grave knowing that your citizens will be following shortly." In response to that grim proclamation, the laughter just came roaring back and Orochimaru somehow grew even angrier. "What? What's so funny!?"

"You really need to get a grip on your minions, Orochimaru," the Tanikage said between chuckles. "It's just funny- this is the closest _anyone's_ ever come to killing me, but for you to lose, just because one of your pet children had an identity crisis…"

Kame finally recognized the undertones of the laughter- it was filled with the hysterical glee of someone who'd expected death and yet received life. Orochimaru must have noticed that as well, because he shifted in an almost nervous way and when he replied it was in a terse tone. "You haven't gone on a rampage in years, so there's no way you have enough chakra to break an Apathy Shell in less than five minutes. You still die, here and now."

Kame decided to take a good look at the forbidden jutsu with his chakra sense, noting that it seemed to cover up the Tanikage's own chakra on all sides. The chakra being sealed away was fighting back, trying to escape, but it was eaten away by the seal in the process. The invasive chakra was breaking as well, but it was almost a race of sorts- the first one of the two to run out would be the loser. However, when Kame probed deeper, he saw something odd: a source of chakra within the Tanikage that was vomiting out power like crazy. If Kame had to describe it, he'd say it was like a dying star; a shattered (but still impressive) husk of energy that was clearly a remnant of something much, much greater.

"The Seventails jinchuriki is a fairly recent one, huh?" The Tanikage's tone had gone from quaking in excitement and hysteria down to a normal, even conversational one. When nobody responded, he answered his own question: "Yeah, they are. The thing is, the Seventails got sealed into them eight months ago, because it got killed sixteen months ago. Can anyone here tell me what's wrong with that?"

After another long silence, Kame responded shakily, "T- Tailed beasts usually c- come back about one to four months after d- dying, so…" he wasn't sure what the Tanikage was getting at, but he hoped to dear god that it was something good. The quiet voice inside of him that dared to hope again wished that maybe the white-robed Kage would spare Kame and Haku because they hadn't destroyed his village.

"And that's an eight-month gap after it died, right?" the Tanikage said, a faint glow starting to form in his eyes.

Those innocent-sounding words launched a flurry of motion, as Orochimaru disgorged a long sword from his mouth and swung it down towards the Tanikage- but before he could land the blow, the Apathy Shell lost its inner war and fell away, releasing the Tanikage's power once more. "Impossible," Orochimaru hissed, but it clearly _was_ possible as the embodiment of it was standing up right in front of them and growing in power by the second.

However, Orochimaru still moved forward to attack and launched a barrage of swipes with the longsword- the Sword of Kusanagi, Kame remembered it was called- and the Tanikage moved back to avoid and parry the incoming blows. Himei, still batlike under the influence of his cursemark's second stage, barked out a sonic pulse that seemed ineffective to Kame until he saw the Tanikage flinch from its effect. That flinch left the Sword of Kusanagi swinging in unopposed towards his face, so the last-second jerk of his head to avoid it ended up being inadequate and a spray of blood stained the white robe.

Then came one of those momentary pauses in a battle, where all the involved people could sense something coming but not understand what, as the Tanikage's bloodstained facemask fluttered to the ground along with his hat. The revealed face was that of an old man, with a head of snow-white hair and skin that was sickly pale as well as wrinkled. Purple eyes, also paled and a little glassy from old age, gazed towards the Sound ninja with harrowing intensity even as the blood dripped down his cheek and stained his white robe.

For the second time, Orochimaru broke the initial standoff by surging forward towards his enemy, only to prove far too slow as the Tanikage leaped straight up into the air with frightening speed and power. Kame tracked the Tanikage's movements, unsure of who he was fighting with anymore or even who was good or evil, unsure of even the basic facts of the situation. _I won't destroy the village, but… can I kill the Tanikage?_ he questioned himself. _Will Orochimaru forgive me if I do?_ _If I kill Orochimaru, then will the Tanikage forgive me? Which one of them is telling the truth about all those destroyed villages, and which one is in the right?_

That question received its answer when the Tanikage's chuckling finally faltered off, replaced by one final shouted statement: "Mass Domination!"

A huge- no, a _gargantuan_ spiral of purple energy spun into existence around his hand and grew wider and wider with each rotation, stretching multiple kilometers out as he flew down towards the ground. Kame had absolutely no chance to stop the dark descent and could only watch as the spiraling purple form, now held out in front of the Tanikage and encompassing not only the entire village but the entire valley, slammed into the ground.

Then Kame was standing in a Hidden Sound base, looking at Grandmother, who was in the middle of a circle comprised of Kame, Haku, Himei, Sankuryu, and Seikaku. She spoke quickly and purposefully: "The bastard used it, then? I pulled you all here on Orochimaru's orders to keep you from getting caught in it, but the Tanikage still has to die." When she spoke about the Tanikage, her voice dropped into a hateful growl. "Prepare yourselves, because I'm sending you back." Kame didn't even have a full second to protest before he was yanked between dimensions and returned to the Valley nearby where he'd left.

While his position was similar, everything else was different- the entire Hidden Valley was shattered, buildings and wall broken down like an earthquake had occurred. The air above Kame had trails of chakra streaming through it, all tainted a purple color and flowing inwards towards a central point:

The Tanikage.

One hand raised, he was absorbing the hundreds if not thousands of chakra streams, all of which were rotating in a spiral and feeding him. Kame's senses began to overload when he tried to focus in- every single one of those thousands of chakra trails had the markings of a different person. Each and every person caught in the valley was having their chakra, their life force, drained out of them and added to the sea of chakra that funneled down into the Tanikage's arm.

 _He… his own village… I was wrong when… no…_

It seemed like it took minutes for Kame, but in all likelihood it took only about twenty seconds for the chakra streams to finish, one by one, as their contributors ran out and _died_. While Kame's stage one sense had a range limit, that was more of a range at which he couldn't sense enough detail for it to be useful; yet even that blurry and undetailed general sense was enough to tell him that, when the last purple light trailed into the Tanikage's arm, he and the Sound shinobi were the only ones left alive in the valley.

Kame glanced up and saw the Tanikage drop his arm to his side, now wholly different in appearance- his sickly pale skin had assumed a slightly more healthy tinge and had lost any trace of wrinkling, his snow-white hair was now a deep purple to match his eyes, and even his body, now visible due to the robe being shredded, was muscled and perfect in stance instead of the slight slouch he'd had before. His voice, too, was now much healthier as it chided the Sound ninja in a mildly amused tone: "You pushed me pretty damn far, Orochimaru, but…" he snorted. "Of all the ways to lose… to get betrayed by some preteen genin…"

Orochimaru's reply came from just behind Kame, literally causing him to flinch hard enough that he toppled over onto his hands and knees. "Your death is still inevitable, you realize? This development just makes it a little bit more… interesting."

Just like earlier, both ex-Kage appeared to grow more serious, but this time… this time, the hollow star that Kame had sensed before was now a raging supernova of seemingly infinite power. Trying to focus on him was like trying to focus on Orochimaru when he'd first used the stage one senses; like trying to touch a flame, stare directly into a bright light, or listen to a ear-shattering noise.

He was reduced to using his normal eyes, which told him a terrible story: Orochimaru looked weakened, Sankuryu was on his last legs, Yodoku was lying dead on the ground, and Himei and Haku weren't in much better shape. _I don't know if we can win this_ , Kame thought.

"All those people… they trusted you, and you killed them?" Haku's words alone could likely be construed as accusatory, but her tone was one of deeply shaken fear and lack of understanding.

"Yes, I did," the Tanikage replied, back in the conversational tone. Kame didn't dare move, immensely grateful for the chance to rest and think in the face of an impending terrible situation. _The Tanikage seems to like banter during fights_ , he thought, _so maybe Haku can keep him talking for a good time_. "My life was more important, so I took theirs to keep my dream alive and to fulfill it."

"What… what dream could be worth…" Haku was on her knees, looking up at the Tanikage with sheer awe and terror like he was some sort of vengeful god. Her fear and shock was intense, but it also confused Kame. _She shouldn't be this personally injured_ , he thought, _that much dead is horrible, but it's also the deaths of people we don't-_

 _Miriki_. Kame remembered the teammate that he'd bullied and mistreated, who'd just been trying to help and befriend him all along. _I'm never going to get to say sorry…_ and that grief was enough to overwhelm his horror at realizing that he didn't care very much about all the innocent Valley residents, overpowering all the indecision just as effectively as thoughts of Haku did. When he looked at the Tanikage again, it was with eyes that looked for something, _anything_ that he could use to put the Valley leader down once and for all.

"My dream… well, I suppose this _is_ my dream," the Tanikage said with a shrug. "Gaining power, ridding the world of yet another village of shinobi. Don't misunderstand; I'm not in this for power for the sake of power, I'm in it for the power to reshape our world and-"

He was interrupted by Sankuryu, who charged towards him with purposeful strides and unleashed a blitz of ranged swipes. The Sound ninja's long claws sent forward enough crisscrossing Dust release chakra to mince anything in their path, turning the Tanikage's entire area into a patchwork of geometrically cut rock…

And _only_ rock, because the Tanikage blurred to the side at the last minute moving almost too fast for Kame's eyes to follow and waving an arm towards Sankuryu while shouting, "Wind!". The resulting blast of wind chakra formed a stream easily ten meters across and a hundred meters long, flinging Sankuryu all the way to the end of it and slamming him into the ruins of a building.

Sankuryu survived it somehow and stood up, but the Tanikage crossed the nearly four hundred meter gap in half a second and thrust a hand towards him at point blank range: "Fire!" A blaze of flame torched the area in a huge cone before him, lasting only a few seconds but leaving behind only a melted area of slag where there had been rubble and absolutely nothing where there had been Sankuryu.

The death of his comrade was sufficient to galvanize Kame into action, but exactly _what_ action he was going to take was a mystery. For all the power that his cursemark had given him, all the bombs and tricks he had up his sleeves, there was nothing he could do against such awe-inspiring power. Anything short of Kage-level would probably just completely fall apart against this unbelievable strength, and Kame was a far cry from Kage-level. The Tanikage turned his gaze to Orochimaru, stepping forward with a normal human's walking speed despite clearly being capable of much more. Kame's horrified paralysis didn't wear off, growing stronger by the second, until-

Haku blinked into existence behind the Tanikage, second stage of her cursemark now active, and swung a fist straight towards his back. The Tanikage turned almost lazily in manner and yet moved far faster than she did, bringing up a hand against her stomach: "Lightning."

The cone of lightning stretched out, arcing against all the surrounding terrain but channeling straight through Haku's vulnerable body. Kame could see her skeleton for brief moments, and she cried out… but not in pain; in rage. She began to crackle with electricity that quickly grew strong enough to rival the Tanikage's, which persisted even after his attack ended and shifted her hair around, causing her eyes to glow the same purple as the lightning. Kame could sense the tentails chakra emerging but for once wasn't afraid of it- _that might be our only hope here…_

"So it _is_ you," the Tanikage said wonderingly. "You didn't grow up how I imagined _at all_."

Whether that was an attempt to distract her or just more of his banter didn't matter, because she ignored it and blitzed behind him with one leg already swinging in an arc and taking his feet out from under him. Before he could fall, she streaked across him once again and hit him with a knee to the face that actually connected hard enough to send him flying further than Kame had even hoped was possible.

 _Wait, that's way further than he should be_ … Kame soon realized that the Tanikage was flying of his own volition as he stabilized and turned back towards Haku. "You might be a problem…"

And then he teleported behind her and slammed a fist down on her back, crushing her to the ground and instantly killing any trace of the tentails' chakra. The blow was powerful enough to crater the ground underneath the impact deep enough to remove Haku from Kame's sight. As the Tanikage straightened, he leaned back slightly to avoid one of Seikaku's arrows that punched through the air where his head had been, before narrowing his eyes and turning to face the mountains where she most likely was hiding. He held a fist back in preparation to unleash yet another blow, and with him so close, Kame could sense the chakra that he was forming in his palm… _fire_ , he identified, _but also… earth?_

"Lava." The Tanikage swung the arm forward in a slow and exaggerated punching motion and a massive amount of half-melting and red-hot rock formed as he made the blow, releasing at the end and hurtling towards the mountainside. The meteoric creation flew multiple kilometers in seconds and struck the mountain hard enough to create a monstrously huge explosion, sending shudders in the ground, waves of heat, and concussive force out far enough for Kame to feel. _There's no way that Seikaku survived that_ , he thought absently, gazing at the mountain with a massive crater taken out of it.

The realization of another teammate's probable death shocked him just enough to remember Haku and he dashed over to her, staggering not from injury or exhaustion but sheer distress. _If she's… no, she can't be dead. She can't be dead, because if she is, then it was my fault, and…_

He fell down to the ground beside her, heart pounding into his ears and mind desperately hoping that he hadn't cost his only friend her life. Haku lay facedown and he froze up, unsure of whether to try to roll her over or not, terrified out of his mind that he'd make things even worse. Seconds ticked by until he noticed the gentle rise and fall of her shoulders and sagged back on his knees, absurdly relieved that he hadn't… that _she_ hadn't paid the ultimate price for his failure to just knuckle down and do what had to be done.

 _I messed up_ , Kame reminded himself. _I took things into my own hands and I was so, so wrong_. The evidence of his mistake was currently walking towards Orochimaru, unleashing projectiles composed of various elements and dealing wanton destruction to the area. _If I just listened to Orochimaru… then… the village would still be gone, but Sankuryu, Seikaku, Yodoku… it's my fault they're dead_.

 _I'm going to die, and so is Haku_. That thought was the scariest one, and the one that finally drew some kind of rebellion from somewhere inside him. Orochimaru and Himei were both still alive and avoiding the Tanikage's careless attacks. _If I…_ Kame moved away from Haku, just in case, and then called out "Tanikage!"

The Tanikage turned to look at him, grinning. "You're the incompetent bastard who let me live!"

Kame winced at that description but kept talking, hoping that Orochimaru and Himei wouldn't attack for the moment. "Did… did you actually destroy the Hidden Snow?"

"Oh, that reminds me…" the Tanikage appeared to consider the question while gathering wind and water chakra in his hand, then flicked it over in the general direction of Orochimaru and Himei. "Ice!" A wave of frost spread across the ground while icy needles showered the area. Himei cried out and toppled from the sky, but before the Tanikage could capitalize Kame desperately tried to get the man's attention back.

"Did you?" he asked, deep down knowing the answer but wishing that his gut instinct was just as wrong as when it had told him that the Tanikage cared about the Hidden Valley.

"Yes."

Kame probably would have flinched at the undeniable confirmation of just how terribly wrong he'd been if he hadn't already been beating himself up. At this point, he was so mentally taxed that simply heaping more guilt onto the already impressive pile couldn't stop him anymore. "And the-"

"If it was a ninja village and it's now gone, it's almost definitely because of me," the Tanikage said without pride, without insanity. It was a simple statement of fact delivered in a calm, serious tone of voice that was somehow more off-putting to Kame than Orochimaru's creeping hiss.

Even though he knew that the Tanikage could kill him in milliseconds with the barest of efforts, Kame was used to being in the same boat with Orochimaru and recklessly went further in his pursuit of answers, helplessly hoping to hear something that might vindicate him. "But if you killed all those people, how are you still…? Why…?"

The Tanikage just looked at him with a blank expression, eyes appraising, and then gave a slight shrug and replied thoughtfully. "I guess I'm killing you last anyway, so I might as well… actually, nevermind." He turned to look towards Orochimaru, who was approaching mounted on the head of another massive snake and preparing a jutsu of some sort. This time, the Tanikage raised both hands, gathering water, wind, and earth chakra in the left one before releasing it with a shout: "Crystal!"

Pink formations of murky but not opaque crystals seemed to crack into existence one after another, shooting forward in a series of spikes until a massive one punched right through Orochimaru's summon. Orochimaru himself dodged the spike and kept moving forwards, finishing his jutsu: "Sword Shadow Clone Jutsu!" Nothing seemed to happen, but he wasn't finished yet, calling out again: "Blade of Kusanagi: Sky Blade!" Only then did Kame sense the hordes of smaller chakra signatures tearing in from all directions, eyes picking them up shortly afterwards- hundreds of glowing swords were coming towards the Tanikage and by extension, Kame.

"Huh," the Tanikage muttered. "Dust." His extended arm seemed to extend with a pale and glowing cylinder of light that stretched on further than Kame's eyes could pick up, and then he began swiping that cylinder of Dust Release chakra through the swords in long, sweeping arcs. It left a trail behind it of the same light and chakra that would vaporize everything in the area after a second or two, laying waste to Orochimaru's attack and even cutting the Sannin in half. The two segments, upper and lower, fell away from each other initially, but then snakes punched out of the wounds and attached to one another, hauling Orochimaru back together.

He turned to face the Tanikage just in time to see a new attack, one that Kame knew to be a mixture of lightning and wind chakra. With the godlike man's quiet utterance of "Gravity," Orochimaru was sent flying away from him, slowing himself to a stop with lengthened snake limbs and ending up a good eighty meters away. "Swift," the Tanikage said as wind, earth, and lightning chakra melded together into his body, then blurred over to close the distance down to twenty meters or so.

"Naga Assault!" Orochimaru shouted in rage and the ground around his feet began to crumble, necrotic snakes emerging and then sweeping forward towards the Tanikage at high speed-

"Force." Six walls of purple-tinted water, earth, and lightning chakra formed in the air around Orochimaru, creating a cube about three meters on a side and stopping the rotting snakes in their tracks. With a puff of smoke, they all disappeared, leaving him seemingly trapped but not at all quelled

At his cry of "Summoning Jutsu: Five-Layer Rashomon," five massive gates exploded into existence in a straight line between him and the Tanikage. Kame shifted slowly towards Haku, wondering if he could possibly escape with her while the two stronger ninja fought, but in the process regaining vision of Orochimaru.

The Sannin was still stuck within the barrier when the Tanikage swung both arms across his chest, crossing them and ending up with his left hand to his right side and vice versa. Earth chakra shimmered to life up above the crossed arms, and then he spun them slowly counterclockwise back to their sides and then crossing in the other direction, in the process calling forth lightning, wind, water, and fire chakra at four other points. At the end of his arms' rotation, there was a pentagon of chakra floating in the air with the five basic chakra natures making up its points, that he then placed two palms up against. Finally showing real effort in his voice, he reared back, then slammed the two side-by-side hands through his chakra creation and shouted, "World Breaker!"

There was light, and heat, and chakra, but _none_ of Kame's senses proved up to the task of handling the sheer and obscene overload handed to them in attempting to understand what was happening. It was just _too much_ to take in on every conceivable level, and it was only about five seconds later, when the effect disappeared as sharply as it had come, that he could start to see and hear and feel things again.

Even then, his mind was still hard-pressed to wrap itself around the sight presented to him, because while the Tanikage stood where he had before using the jutsu, and the village to his left was also just as it had been… to the right, there was a curved cone of melted slag and ash that stretched further than Kame's eyes could see; far enough and wide enough to destroy a fifteen-kilometer-wide patch of the mountains and everything before and after it. In the wake of that attack, there was absolutely no trace of any of the five Rashomon, much less Orochimaru, and all Kame could do was collapse beside a prone Haku and regret.

That regret only grew stronger as Haku stirred a bit and got into a sitting position next to him, equally stunned, and reached a peak level as Himei flapped weakly down to join them. The three Sound shinobi said nothing- there was nothing to say. Kame's moment of weakness had cost not only the victory, but the lives of Sankuryu, Sutetchi, Yodoku, Seikaku, Orochimaru, Keikiro… _Miriki_ , and every other person in the valley. Soon enough, Kame would probably be joining them in death.

The Tanikage turned towards them and began walking, uncontested by any of them because there was no contest to be had. Each and every one of them were exponentially outclassed by this opponent in every way imaginable, and their efforts combined wouldn't even leave a scratch. ' _Hope'_ , Kame remembered himself thinking earlier, _what a joke. What the hell is hope going to do in a situation like this? If all five sitting Kage came running out of the mountains to save us, we'd still almost definitely die before they got here_. Despite that message being repeated and reinforced in his mind, though, there was still a stubborn little corner of his psyche that flat-out refused to give way.

 _Maybe_ , it whispered, _just maybe…_

The Tanikage stepped within ten meters of their sad little group and raised one hand that filled with fire chakra. _Maybe…_ Kame raised a hand to shield himself from the blast. _Maybe…_ When it seemed to wait longer than it should before coming, he looked up to see the Tanikage with purple eyes narrowed in consternation over something, hand dropping as he gazed intently over the Sound ninjas' heads. _Maybe…_

Then the Tanikage widened his eyes in surprise and outrage as Kame heard a small 'poof' from behind himself and felt the presence of Grandmother. In the brief seconds after her arrival, she spoke once and only once to the Tanikage: "You will not take any more children from me."

"No!" The Tanikage roared and dashed forward with blinding speed, reaching out with a hand and discharging chakra. "Disruption Wave-"

Whatever it was, it definitely connected, as Kame felt his whole chakra network thrown out of coordination and scrambled. However, it also didn't connect hard enough, because regardless of the scrambling, Kame felt himself slip away into that space between worlds. The last things he saw were those piercing, purple eyes twisted in wrath, and then nothingness.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

When Kame came to, his first thought was one of deep gratitude, because by all rights he, Haku, and Himei should have been killed by the Tanikage in the ruins of the Hidden Valley. His second thought was one of confusion, because he wasn't in one of Orochimaru's lairs- he was lying in a forest with no recognizable landmarks in sight, and the time of day was early noon as opposed to the nighttime it had been when he'd lost consciousness. His third thought was one of worry, because that meant the jutsu may have gone awry after all and Haku-

Haku was beside him, alive but asleep on the forest floor and looking remarkably peaceful for all the crap that they'd just gone through. Kame wasn't sure whether or not to make an attempt to shake her awake or not, opting to let her sleep at least for the moment as he tried to figure out where the hell they were.

When he climbed to the top of one of the trees, he saw the forest stretching for miles in every direction and possible hints of a town or two scattered about the horizon, as well as a few distinctive gaps in the treeline that signified roads. Despite the fact that none of those things were recognizable landmarks, Kame now knew where they were: the only nation with forests that large and that lush, the Land of Fire.

He registered a few more details and headed back down the tree, happy at the good news: Haku was waking up and seemed to be without any serious harm. The bad news was that one of those roads was only meters away from where they'd lain and they were both in uniform as Hidden Sound shinobi, which meant that any passerby to have seen them would know their origin.

Of course, they hadn't been awakened or attacked in their (bare minimum) twelve-hour sleep, so it was possible that they might have remained undetected for that whole time. His instincts screamed that that was a ridiculous and dangerous assumption to make, and that he should be more rational about their chances… but then again, after the miracle that had just happened to save his life, Kame figured he was entitled to start having a little bit of hope about their situation.

In one of those poetic and ironic twists of fate that the higher powers seemed to enjoy subjecting him to, Kame was punished for allowing that thought to cross his mind by the arrival of his enemies. Leaf ANBU appeared one after another in the trees and ground surrounding him and Haku, all clearly prepared to unleash lethal force at a moment's notice and altogether far too scared of the mentally and physically weary genin that they outnumbered. "Ninja of the Hidden Sound, submit to the authority of the Hidden Leaf at once or be incapacitated by force!"

Kame wanted to just give in- he really did- but at the same time, he knew what the price for Haku would be, and that was a price he would _never_ be willing to pay. Instead of saying the words that would end this twisted adventure and finally let him really and truly rest, he moved to draw a weapon-

"We surrender," Haku said. He whirled to face her, painfully torn between honoring her desire to end the stress and strife and acting against her will to save her life, but it ended up not mattering. She had surrendered and he had let down his guard in surprise, so when the genjutsu came it caught both of them and Kame was once again unconscious with no control over his own fate.

He could only hope.


	43. Arc 4 Vol 11: A Path to Redemption

**(A/N) No character profile on this chapter; I'm super tired. Might do one on the new Raikage tomorrow, but for now let's just go straight into the story.**

In stories, people always talked about being imprisoned like it was terrible, having sit there with absolutely nothing to do but think to oneself for days on end. Kame, the overconfident idiot that he'd been back in his childhood, had laughed it off- why would it be bad to be alone with his thoughts? He'd enjoyed being alone with his thoughts, so it followed that prison wouldn't be all that bad.

After only somewhere between five minutes and five hours (he couldn't tell the time) Kame could guarantee that prison was indeed all that bad. Being alone with his thoughts was something that he'd been desperately avoiding for the last few _months_ , so all that piled up emotion was making him wish for literally anything to distract himself. Unfortunately, he was out of luck on that front; his cell contained a bed, a sink, a toilet, and four walls with no apparent entrance, and the only noises to be heard were the ones he made himself. Even his paper and tools and clothes had been taken away, replaced by a stock green shirt and pants.

With all of nothing to get interested in, he had to consider what the hell had just happened, which was an unhappy prospect to say the least. Every single occupant of the Hidden Valley was dead, because-

 _Wait_ , he thought, grasping at some sort of salvation as he came to a realization. _If I blew the bomb, they'd all be dead anyway. The Tanikage or me, no matter what happened, they were going to die, so it's not really my fault that all those people_ -

But that still left so much guilt. As illogical as it was, he found it so much less painful to think about the dead innocents, and while the Tanikage's two guards and the few genin and children he'd run across were a bit more guilt-inducing, at the end of the day the real pain wasn't from them. In a second illogical fit of emotion, he was a thousand times more hurt by the deaths of objectively worse human beings- the missing-ninja he'd spent seven long months growing attached to. _I know that those kids and their teacher deserved to live a lot more than Seikaku did_ , he thought, _but I can't make myself feel worse about them than her_.

And the simple fact remained that it was his fault, _entirely_ his fault, that Seikaku had been killed by the Tanikage's hand. Sankuryu, burned alive, was again squarely a result of Kame's weak will, and so were Sutetchi and Yodoku. Orochimaru might be the only one Kame didn't feel bad for, but even as he thought about the man who'd helped him save Haku and given him sanctuary for those long months.

 _Oh my god_ , Kame realized with a particularly brutal pang of self-hatred, _he was right the whole time. I got selfish because he didn't treat me well and decided that I knew better than he did, and now all those people are dead_. Now with a touch of mental hysteria that made him briefly wonder if all the mental stress had finally made him lose it, he kept thinking: _So does that make me objectively more evil than Orochimaru? His plan was based around actual revenge for an evil act and would have ended in a lot of death, sure, but my plan was based around my prideful belief that I was smarter and better than him and ended in even more dead people_.

His careful mental dodging around one certain person finally slipped up and he hit the second most painful thing to think about: Miriki. It didn't matter how many times he rationally reasoned that it wasn't his fault, because even being in the village when he'd died was enough to ravage his remaining shreds of self-respect. Miriki was living evidence of one wrongdoing he couldn't explain away: the mistreatment of a kid who just wanted to be his friend was the first in the long chain of events that convinced Kame that he wasn't a very good person.

Now Miriki was gone, Orochimaru was gone, _Haku was…_

He couldn't- no, wouldn't think about that, which was why when the wall clicked smoothly and slid to the side, he was actually grateful rather than apprehensive or careful to see that the Kazekage stood in the doorway. After a long silence that neither party seemed comfortable in breaking, Gaara took a heavy breath and then looked like he was about to speak, but then lapsed back into the silent, loaded staring that was making Kame more anxious by the second.

Ultimately, the stalemate was shattered by the one thing that he was worried enough about to overpower his emotional anxiety: "Is Haku still alive?"

He regretted asking the question immediately because every possible answer would only make him more hurt inside, and Gaara seemed to share the sentiment because his face shifted from mixed to purely downcast when he responded. "Haku is… she's alive, for the moment at least. I managed to avoid a summary execution and push for a neutral trial."

"But…" Kame, for once, knew nothing about something. "What kind of trial?"

"The shinobi union process for pardoning of missing-ninja requires a neutral trial, which any Kage may choose to participate in-"

"Pa- Pardon?" Kame all but whispered. He hadn't even considered that possibility, because it would mean opening a chink in the armor of willful ignorance towards Haku's fate. As long as he carefully avoided thinking anything about her, he couldn't fall back into a pit of despair- it was selfish, but then again, so was he.

Gaara looked apologetic for some reason. "I… the trial was the only option I had, but the Raikage, Mizukage, and Jettokage are all going to be present, carrying a clear majority over myself and the Hokage. I can't promise that this won't end with Haku…" he trailed off and pressed his lips together in annoyance. "I'm here to tell you that the trial's in a few minutes, and to prepare yourself. There's also someone here who wanted to see you."

"Who…?" Kame tried to stand from the sitting position he'd been in for a very long time and felt a huge rush of blood to his head that sent his vision dark and killed whatever plans he'd had of rising. He dropped back onto the bed and straightened, blinking the spots out of his eyes to see a ghost standing in the doorway.

"Hey, Kame." Miriki waved his hand in greeting, looking for all the world like he was still alive.

"I… how are you…" Kame opened and closed his mouth uselessly. _I did go insane_ , he realized. _I guess seeing Gaara was the last straw_.

"Oh, you thought you killed me?" Miriki raised his eyebrows with a mild smile that only grew as he kept talking. "And you're seriously _that_ torn up over it? Well, I'm flattered, but let me make this clear: if I ever die, I wouldn't waste my time haunting you, I'd go straight to heaven and… well, that part doesn't matter. Point is…" he trailed off as Kame felt a tear roll down his cheek.

In the face of his friend, Kame felt his throat grow raw but muscled through it and said the words he'd regretted not saying every day for the last seven months. "Miriki, I'm sorry."

"What?"

"I said…" Kame swallowed, finally meeting the five-pointed eyes of his friend. "I'm so, so sorry for treating you like garbage for years, and for looking down on you for even longer than that. You helped Haku when no one else would, and you-"

"So did you," Miriki pointed out. When Kame faltered and tried to think of a reply to that, Miriki took over the conversation: "Look, Kame, I appreciate this, but it's not super unnecessary. Any ill will I had for you went out the window when you gave up all the stuff I thought you were obsessed with for the sake of one of the people I thought you hated. You aren't a shit person, at least not anymore, and I'm not gonna hold a grudge, okay?"

Kame nodded, not trusting himself to speak. It wasn't just Miriki- anyone he'd wronged forgiving him was something he'd seriously needed to hear. Miriki was a better- "Plus I think I'd honestly rather go back to the insults if you're gonna start crying on me, dude." _There it is_ , Kame thought as he felt that oh-so-familiar flare of outrage that was almost perpetually active in him when Miriki was nearby. He began to issue a scalding retort but Miriki wisely turned the conversation back to a more somber tone, effectively terminating any chance Kame had of getting him back.

"Look, dude, I'm just gonna be honest here- you're screwed." _Oh, yeah._ "Me, Keikiro, Gunaji, and Senshiko-" Kame started in surprise as the name of the jonin he thought he'd seen die was mentioned, and Miriki responded to the unasked question. "Oh, Senshiko survived with some damage, Keikiro cut out the acid. That's not important, what matters is that you… I mean, answer me honestly. Did you destroy the Hidden Valley?"

"No, I d…" Kame couldn't say the untrue words out loud. At the same time, though, he was also incapable of taking verbal ownership to one of the few people that seemed to have faith in him, so he settled on a compromise choked out through gritted teeth: "I helped to do it."

"The official story is that the Hidden Sound and Hidden Waterfall made an attack on the Hidden Valley and destroyed it, killing everyone inside." _Everyone? What about the-_ "Senshiko, Gunaji, and Keikiro… they're…" in an incredibly rare moment where he seemed unsure of what to say, Miriki gazed off into the middle distance. "Their family and friends are all gone, and… well, they're gonna be at this trial thing."

"I didn't-" Kame gathered himself before choosing his words carefully. "Miriki, Orochimaru and the Waterfall might have attacked, but it was the Tanikage who ended up killing all the Valley ninja _and_ Waterfall ninja, and even Orochimaru. He slaughtered everyone… can you tell the Kazekage, or someone else who can do something about it? Please?"

Miriki considered Kame for a few moments that ended with him nodding slowly and taking a step back away from the door. "I'll… I'll do my best."

The door slid shut and Kame was alone once more. This time, his turmoil was lessened and replaced with a frantic and desperate racking of his mind that was usually reserved to combat- the threat of Haku's death and a possible escape from it had thrust him straight into full-out panic mode. That was how he spent the next few minutes, racking his brain for any possible way he could save her. When the door finally opened again, it was to reveal two masked ninja clad in the grey and nondescript vests of the Shinobi Union who took him through winding hallways until they reached their final destination.

He looked into the room and saw it mostly shrouded in darkness with a lit spot in the middle, Haku standing in it looking worried but unharmed and clad in a green outfit similar to his own. It took- well, not _all_ of his willpower, but it took a lot more than it should have to keep himself from running over to her, but he kept his cool and approached at a normal pace, stopping himself beside her. When he did, the lights surrounding them flickered back on and he found himself looking up towards an array of seats where the most powerful ninja in the world sat and looked down at him, faces shaded _just_ enough by their hats to prevent him from being able to discern their emotions.

He could, however, see the symbols on their placemarks: In red, the fire symbol of the land of fire, occupied by a figure that he knew must be Naruto Uzumaki. The other occupied seats were emblazoned with the green wind symbol for Lord Gaara, the deep blue of the Jettokage and lighter blue of the Mizukage, the dark brown of the Tsuchikage, and finally the yellow of the new Raikage, Sanpaki. In the middle of them all, directly ahead of Kame and on the Kages' level fifteen feet above him, sat a person in grey armor with a grey symbol for 'iron' marking him as the sitting leader of the Land of Iron.

He was the first to speak, his voice surprisingly fluid and intellectual-sounding despite the fact that samurai were stereotyped in ninja culture to be hard and gruff: "With the arrival of the first accused party, Kame Hakiara, we now begin the procedures. Present are the Kazekage, Hokage, Raikage, Mizukage, Tsuchikage, and Jettokage. The confirmed crimes of the first accused party, Kame Hakiara, include kidnapping, treason, and aiding in murder."

Kame realized that, while under Orochimaru's sway, he'd never actually directly killed anyone. It had always been Hiretsuna, or Seikaku, or Orochimaru himself who had done the deed. Of course, if murder by failure to act counted, then he was up there with the worst of the missing-ninja-

"This committee has been called in order to decide on the Kazekage's proposal of pardoning the accused and allowing them re-entrance as a shinobi of the Village Hidden in the Sand. Before a final vote is called, all parties present may try to make arguments for or against such action." The Shinobi Union, over the years, had morphed from a council between the villages whose job was to prevent war into a bureaucratic monstrosity with jurisdiction over nearly anything, whose job was to police the villages themselves. This wasn't necessarily a bad thing, as some of the shadier and more corrupt aspects of village administration had been dealt with, but it carried with it a subtle shift in power and autonomy away from the villages and towards the Union.

The Shinobi Union's major jobs now included gathering of intel on all legitimate shinobi from their villages of origin, who had to pay a tithe of information to stay in the Shinobi Union and get to have a seat at the table. In the past this would have been inacceptable, but as peacetime became more and more of a reality and shinobi from various villages trusted each other, hoarding information gradually turned into a thing of the past. Only one or two villages refused to join the Union, and they paid a heavy price in legitimacy, jobs, politics, and reputation for that choice. "The defendant may now make an initial case for himself."

 _Oh shit, that's my cue_. "Uhmm…" _What the hell am I supposed to say?_ His mind was still in frantic planning mode, but all of the strategies of argument and rebuttal, point and counterpoint, fell apart in his mind. He knew that Gaara had pulled strings to let him even reach this point, and he could not afford to waste his life because of social anxiety, but… _How do I defend the value of my existence with words to a group of Kage?_ "I, uh…"

It was useless, as the Raikage seemed less than hesitant to note in exactly the sort of gruff and brutal voice that Kame would've expected from his samurai counterpart: "I'm not seeing why this is up for discussion. This criminal assisted in many of Orochimaru's illicit kidnapping attempts, including one that targeted my own jinchuriki, and just destroyed an entire shinobi village in cold blood. Speaking of which, is the Waterfall going to suffer any consequences for assisting in that disaster?"

The samurai moderator shot a look towards the Raikage. "I would remind you that the Village Hidden in the Waterfalls is not a part of the Shinobi Union and is therefore suffering the sanctions as such. In addition, their culpability is not in question at the moment, so I would have you ensure that further statements are relevant to the discussion at hand."

"I didn't…" Kame wrung his hands nervously, then stopped it thinking that it probably made him look guilty, which of course led to him awkwardly looking around and coming off even more guilty-looking. "I… I didn't help Orochimaru destroy the Hidden Valley."

"What?" The samurai moderator seemed mildly surprised by that statement. "You're standing in a seal that prevents lying, which should mean… ah, you must have been affected by a memory-alteration genjutsu of some sort."

"What? No!" Kame shook his head. "I wasn't the one who destroyed the Hidden Valley, and that's not a genjutsu at all!" _Miriki_ , he thought, _you didn't tell them?_ It was too late to worry about that anymore now, though, so he gathered himself and made his case: "While it is true that Orochimaru and I attacked the Hidden Valley, it was the Tanikage himself who killed everyone inside and around the village. He used some sort of chakra-draining jutsu to kill the majority of people there, and then unleashed a bunch of other attacks using various elements to kill off the survivors one by one, including Orochimaru."

The Kage shared glances, but Kame had a sneaking suspicion that they weren't favorable towards his story, a suspicion that was confirmed by the samurai moderator's next statement: "You've clearly been placed under a genjutsu; as the Tanikage is dead."

 _What!? No!_ "That's not possible," Kame said.

"There's irrefutable evidence of both of those accounts," came the emotionless reply. "It's regrettable that you aren't in possession of the facts, because that may hamper your ability to argue your own case. As such, we will move on to the case of your comrade for the moment. The second accused party, Haku Yorutsume, has confirmed crimes of murder, treason, and kidnapping. Keep in mind that among those she has murdered are the majority of the Hidden Valley's population-"

" _What!?_ " It might have hurt their case, but Kame was unable to keep his mouth shut on that one. "Haku didn't do that!"

"Shut up, kid." The Mizukage's rural-accented voice trailed in from up in the seats. "You're under some genjutsu, so stop talking and let the grown-ups handle this."

"Ironic coming from you, Korekuta," the Raikage growled. "Ironic, but you do have a point. Kame, you think that what you're saying is the truth, which means you're definitely under a genjutsu. With that in mind, almost anything you say is meaningless."

"But-" Kame fumed.

"Enough," the chairman said. "The autopsies on the chakra-drained corpses in the Hidden Valley revealed near-exact symptoms as the ones conducted on the Yorutsume clan's residence as well as one chunin killed during the attack on the Hidden Leaf. If you continue to demonstrate an inability to understand that with an altered memory, you are unable to contribute to the description of events, then I will have you removed from the room."

Kame bit his tongue to prevent a flurry of angry words. _This is my goddamn life that they're discussing_ , he raged internally, _and I don't even get a seat at the table? I swear, if I-_

Haku's hand snaked into his own and he looked up to see her sympathetic expression. It was the same look she'd given him every time he'd started to give in under Orochimaru, and like each time she'd worn it before, it was enough to rally him back from the darkness. He kept her hand held in his, partly because he felt like he needed it for support, and partly because it was surprisingly warm and soft despite the sheer amount of damage it had dished out.

"Enough talking about the boy," the Raikage decreed. "He's less important; we'll deal with him later. What matters now is that we deal with the girl." Kame squeezed her hand as he mentally restrained himself from another outburst. "She's one of two things: an uncontrollable monster who's destroyed two villages; or someone with full control who also _destroyed two villages_."

"Yeah, Gaara," the Mizukage drawled, "What were you thinking with her?"

"I was thinking that I didn't want to kill a child," Gaara snapped back coldly. "It's doubly ironic for someone raised in peacetime to be explaining to _me_ -" he stopped himself. "Apologies, Mizukage."

Naruto, who'd been silent for the entire meeting, finally spoke to Gaara in a pleading voice. "Look, Gaara… don't you see that she's a danger? Can you honestly explain to me a situation where she's _not_ too dangerous to let live?"

Gaara whirled towards the other elder Kage, shared a long glance, and then slumped. "I'm not going to sit by and let a child innocent of anything other than being born to the wrong parents get killed. I was twice the menace she was and you reached out to me- why is it that she's so different?"

This time, it was Naruto's turn to remain silent for a long time, long enough for the Jettokage to break his own silence. "We should vote. This trial is a waste of precious time."

Kame knew what that would mean for Haku, and he also knew that this time he'd be trapped in the base and unable to save her. He felt his arm tremble in fear and rage, turning to look at her and seeing her pained face compounding his own emotions until he was sure he would snap and try to throw an attack towards the Kage-

Then the door was opened smoothly and a new figure strode into the room, tall and graceful and seeming to almost glide across the floor with perfect steps and posture. A long white coat covered almost their whole body, but when they stood in front of Kame and Haku, the blue eye was enough to identify them: Ginsenbo, Miriki's cousin and the golden child of the Kosuki clan. _Why is he…?_

The Kage seemed to share the sentiment, a couple of them half-rising but all of them starting to make confused noises, but then Ginsenbo spoke it was somehow enough to silence them all. In precise, yet somehow agreeable tones he began to speak, moving his hands and pacing animatedly to underline his words: "Gathered Kage, it's come to my attention that you are holding trial over these two criminals.

"Evidently, they've been placed under genjutsu of some sort, making their testimony useless." _How did he know that?_ "It's hardly a fair trial, and it will almost definitely end with their execution, which while unfair given their mentally handicapped circumstances would in the end be justice for those they've wronged. However, I believe that there's a simpler and easier solution; one that would make up for their past wrongdoings and simultaneously be a punishment for them. A way to make a positive impact greater than the negative one they've left behind with Orochimaru.

"It is my suggestion that you take measures to ensure their deaths should they betray you; then allow them an... opportunity to make good on their promises of better behavior. Their experience as underlings of Orochimaru may allow them into his network even after his death, ensuring that they can eliminate all traces of his system without giving them any chance to flee. In addition, once they do so, they will have eradicated a great threat and effectively shown that they will contribute to the Shinobi Union even at risk of their own lives."

He turned slightly towards the Raikage, Mizukage, and Tsuchikage: "With the addition of seals that could kill them and a manager to keep them under control, there is no risk to anyone besides them- there are only three outcomes. Death by our activation of the seal, death by Orochimaru's underlings, or..." he turned away from those three, all of whom rocked back slightly, and then redirected his gaze towards the Hokage, Kazekage, and Jettokage before continuing: "And the third outcome, which would be them achieving redemption." Just like their counterparts, the three other Kage seemed to relax slightly in consideration.

"I… who are you?" The samurai sounded bewildered.

"A civilian brother to a ninja friend of theirs, just submitting his idea before an opportunity goes to waste." _That still doesn't explain how he knew about sealing_ , Kame reasoned, but at this point it clearly didn't matter.

Ginsenbo removed himself from the room while the Kage deliberated about the situation, and then the vote came. Hands rose into the air one by one until the decision was reached: a unanimous agreement in favor of Ginsenbo's plan.

A plan that gave Haku and Kame their shot at life.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Kame knew that the seal was underneath his skin, over his heart, but for the life of him he couldn't feel any difference. The Shinobi Union surgeons knew their craft and the seal that he knew could kill him at a moment's notice was still undetectable to any of his senses; even the surgery that he knew had happened didn't even leave him sore. An idea that the whole 'seal' thing might be an elaborate ruse crossed his mind, but flitted away just as quickly because the consequences for making that assumption would be literally deadly.

He'd had his possessions returned to him, as did Haku, and they stood side-by-side at the edge of the Land of Iron, facing in the direction of where they knew primary lair of Orochimaru was hidden. Kame's heart was still in turmoil over receiving the confirmation that the Tanikage was dead along with Orochimaru.

Deep down, he still didn't believe that first part. The godlike man who'd been obliterating mountains like it was nothing couldn't have lost to Orochimaru; he must have faked his own death. At the same time, though, he found it (to his surprise) almost equally unbelievable that the snake Sannin whose miraculous returns from the grave were dotted throughout history was actually and permanently dead.

He'd only had more and more questions raised within him over the last few hours since that trial. He hadn't gotten any chance to say goodbye to anyone, because after the trial he'd been whisked off to the surgery center, then an interrogation chamber, and then handed his belongings and shoved out the main door. The entire thing had felt amazingly informal for an official mission to be agents against the Sound- Kame had a sneaking suspicion that most of the people involved thought they'd die almost immediately.

Still, at the same time and for the first time in months, he had a clear path in his future. The day that he and Haku managed to destroy Orochimaru's organization was the day that he could return home; the day that he and Haku could be safe. No matter how many obstacles might stand in his path before then, for once he felt an odd sense of surety that he would find a way to get around them all. He slipped his hand into Haku's, finding it easier to do it now- after relying on each other so much, it was second nature to seek solace in her, right?

At least, that was the reason he fed himself.

However, the second-happiest surprise of the day was yet to come, because an all-too-familiar voice trailed over to them from behind. "Hey guys, wait up!" Kame's heart skipped a beat as he turned to see Miriki jogging in pursuit of them, quickly closing the distance and ending up standing to his right. "I thought I almost missed you- you'd think after all those missions, you would've learned to take into account how late I usually am."

That statement that was incorrect on so many levels aside for the moment, Kame got over his shock and did his best to meld the hundreds of questions on the tip of his tongue into a single one: "Wha... Who... Why?"

"Why what?" Miriki thought for a moment. "Why am I here? I guess I didn't have anything better to do." Kame looked at him with disbelief. "Okay, okay, you got me. I've been disavowed or excommunicated or whatever from my clan, so-"

"Why?"

"'Cause it was the only way to get Ginsenbo to genjutsu those Kage, dumbass. Come on, keep up, we've still got a lot of ground to cover here-"

"Genjutsu the Kage!?" Kame tried and failed to keep his tone calm.

"Well, I guess genjutsu's a pretty strong word for what he does. He's really, _really_ good at getting people to make decisions that he wants them to, so subtly that they never notice, which is what he did to the Kage... Okay, how about 'enhanced bargaining?' Yeah, that sounds about right," Miriki said, looking down at his fingers and counting off, "-Next one… why did I get Ginsenbo to do that? Well, he wanted me out of the clan so my ninja achievements don't bring them into the spotlight and I wanted to help you two. That Ghettokage-"

"Jettokage," Kame corrected him automatically.

"-Whatever, that guy was pretty sketchy, thought-wise, so that's when I knew something was off. Ginsenbo saw it too and offered me a deal: I leave the clan, and he saves you two. Of course, I guess now that leaves me with nothing better to do than go off and..."

Kame, who'd been running on a curious autopilot for most of the conversation, finally reasserted mental control and registered all that he'd heard. _He left his clan for us..._ Although words couldn't hope to suffice, Kame owed it to his friend to try. "Thanks," He said, trying to condense the gratitude roaring through him into the simple statement. "And… I'm sorry," he said, helpless to prevent his tone from going miserable.

"Hey, don't go getting hysterical on me again, man." Miriki held up two hands defensively. "I didn't agree to watch over you for months so that I could be a shoulder to cry on." Once again, he seemed to read the room as both Kame and Haku reacted in surprise at his words. "Oh, I didnt- my bad, sorry. I'm the one they ended up picking to be keeping you two on a leash, because of some crap about having already resisted the call of evil or whatever. Honestly, though, it's because Ginsenbo wanted me out as soon as possible and Ginsenbo _always_ gets what he wants. So yeah, I guess I'm sticking with you guys for the next few months or so..."

 _Months_ , Kame thought. The prospect of going back out there, trying to find and deal with Orochimaru- no, to find and deal with his remaining underlings, seemed just a little bit less grim with Miriki there. In fact, with the new information that he hadn't been in a genjutsu and all those events really _had_ happened, Kame was a lot less afraid in general. If Orochimaru really was well and truly dead and so was the Tanikage, then all Kame had to do was deal with the remaining laboratories; a comparatively far easier task. In fact, with Haku and Miriki here… _Huh._ He was startled to realize that, as much as he was annoyed by Miriki's constant cockiness and informality, it never failed to be amusing and put a smile on his face.

Whatever the long road to freedom may have held, for once Kame's illogical emotions decided to give him confidence and happiness in his ability to walk it with his teammates at his sides.


	44. Arc 5 Vol 1: Reunions

**(A/N) Massive apologies, but I realized that in my flu-dazed state last night I made some errors and I had to fix that last chapter. The only changes that have happened are that [1] Orochimaru is officially considered dead by the Shinobi Union, [2] Miriki is in charge of making sure Kame and Haku don't turn (I.E. he can use their seals to kill them), and [3] Ginsenbo convincing the Kage is a little bit better-executed, although I'm still a little bit unhappy with how that scene in particular turned out.**

 **I'm also going to stop using the profiles at the tops of the chapters for every single chapter, and use them less and less in general. If I'm being completely honest it was too much of a crutch that I could use to avoid writing in my information. I might go back and edit older chapters until I'm not using the profiles at all, but as of right now the plan is to gradually if not completely stop using them in the future. Of course, if people don't like that plan, feel free to inform me and I can keep doing them.**

* * *

"I'm gonna be honest, guys- Gunaji is going to try to kill you if we run into him," Miriki advised. They'd been walking along the long road through the Land of Rivers towards the first of Orochimaru's bases that they'd decided to move against: the one near the ruins of the Hidden Valley. With two days of travel facing them, Miriki had grown to annoyed with the silent walking to keep quiet and begun speaking about the first thing on his mind, regardless of how touchy of a subject it might be.

"Ever since Haku… well, anyway, ever since then he's been promising revenge on her. Then on you," he said to Kame, "-For helping her, and that was all before all that stuff went down in the Valley. We got contacted and told that we were the only shinobi left from our village, and to go there. Gunaji had to see his family…" Miriki's voice petered out for a moment before returning just a little bit less upbeat. "He's not going to rest with you two alive. Keikiro and Sagino are… well, Keikiro's less upset, but she's an optimist so she might just be hiding it. Senshiko's pregnant, but Deihaka-sensei's…" He faltered for good this time when he saw how that particular topic was painful for the other two ninja beside him. Kame couldn't explain why, but hearing about Deihaka and Senshiko starting a family, especially _Senshiko_ , whose family he'd been partially responsible for murdering, was too depressing for him to hide and Miriki picked up on it quickly.

As a result of that negative emotion, Kame was back to his old habit of nervously fiddling with paper, except now he was just folding little origami animals and objects. At the moment, he was assembling a paper shuriken, which he'd done so often that it was nearly second nature to him at this point. In fact, his uncontrollable quirk had ended up inadvertently making his bingo book entry a bit more interesting: he'd thoughtlessly dropped and left behind paper shuriken on one too many missions and it became known as a pattern. Now the paper shuriken were his calling card, and despite the quick laugh he and Haku had shared at how stupid the thought was, he'd nonetheless rolled with it and kept a large supply of them in his pack.

The silence returned, and it wasn't exactly _unwelcome_ , but it also felt the tiniest bit wrong. Kame almost felt as though friends, when reunited, should find conversation flowing and easy; a lack of it right now was offensive to the corner of his mind that had always been preaching at him about how he was supposed to act in social situations. He decided to oblige it and took his turn blurting out the first thing to come to mind: "So, what happened with Keikiro and you?"

Miriki looked at him with narrowed eyes, then back towards Haku, and then at him again, before responding in a threatening tone. "I don't know, _Kame_ , what's happening with you and-"

"Nevermind! Sorry, I shouldn't have gone there, sorry. So, uh…" _Come on_ , Kame searched his mind, _think of something else._ "So, your eyes have five lines now, yeah? Who's the lucky girl?"

Miriki's face split open with a slow grin that only ever came out right before he revealed some little piece of information that was sure to mess with Kame. "You're the lucky girl, stupid."

"I…" _What?_

"I said you're the reason it came out!" Miriki shrugged, seeming far too open about such an emotional thing. "When you left with Haku, I realized that I misjudged you as much as you misjudged me, and that did it. So, _Lucky Girl_ , do you-"

"What does it do?" Kame wanted to escape this topic before that nickname had a chance to become a thing. If his time with Orochimaru had taught him one thing, it was that even simple conversations could be like trying to walk through a minefield.

"Huh? Oh, I- What the hell is that!?" Miriki flinched and actually fell back, gazing in shock at something over Kame's shoulder. Instincts honed from seven months of living in fear flared up and Kame rolled forward, turning around to the sight of a massive creature swooping down from the sky towards him. He crouched, bent forward, and then threw his arms out to the sides and drew and launched several kunai in rapid succession, cursing himself for failing to hear or sense the monster coming, and-

The creature disappeared, and Kame was left in the road with Miriki's laughter echoing through his ears. "You should've seen the… the look…" he was trying, and failing, to form a coherent sentence through the giggling. "Oh god, you just did a stupid-ass roll and…"

Kame, now consciously aware of the hunched and paranoid-seeming stance he was in, cleared his throat and straightened up. "I responded to a tactical threat," he said stiffly, itching to kick the Kosuki boy.

In response, he got another snicker. "Sure, sure…" Miriki started in a pseudo-serious voice, then immediately shook his head and then shot back to his normal one: "Nope, I can't do it. You look like a kid trying to play ninja! I swear to god, if you do that in the middle of a fight…"

"It's…" Kame hadn't realized, but his stance _had_ changed gradually. With growing horror, he realized that nobody around him would have told him, other than- "Haku, tell him. That's a normal stance, right?"

"Uh…" Haku gave him a pitying smile. "It's kind of…"

Miriki finished the statement for her. "It's kind of stupid. You look like a crab."

"I…" Kame had to take an objective look and concede that his once-careful combat stance had been reduced over the months into one that indeed made him look like a terrified crab. Slightly bent knees, a back that was arched forward and his arms held out to the sides made him seem like he'd been caught staring at something on the ground and didn't know what to do other than freeze. It wasn't the end of the world, of course, and he'd just have to be careful to retrain himself in a less stupid way, but…

"Why didn't anyone tell me?" The words came out more hurt-sounding than he meant them to be.

"Well…" Haku's face remained pitying. "Uh… who _would_ tell you?"

She was right. Sankuryu and Seikaku had kept to themselves, Grandmother and Haku would never insult him, Hiretsuna didn't have the slightest clue about anything related to looking good, and Himei was… well, Himei. Orochimaru wouldn't have given a crap, and that left absolutely no one else. _Damn it_ , Kame thought, but nonetheless made several mental notes to make sure he didn't reinforce the awkward habit any more.

"So, you never answered my question about… oh, I get it." Kame realized why he hadn't sensed or heard the approach of that huge illusory creature; Miriki must now be able to affect his vision. "Stage five was the eyes?"

"Yep. Anything new on your end?"

Haku actually responded before Kame did. "We both got cursemarks, which… I don't think now's really a good time, but they're pretty cool." Kame echoed the sentiment, a creeping suspicion about the particular road they were walking starting to enter his mind.

"I got a new puppet, and I think I'm really close to unlocking an Earth change of nature, plus I- oh, I can…" he decided it would be better to show than to tell and hit his thumb, made a few handsigns, and then threw his arm down onto the ground with Hiro's vibrant and happy chakra signature in mind.

"Hey Kame, what's up!" The little spider had grown since Kame had first met him, now a good foot and a half across. Needless to say, Miriki's reaction was almost as priceless as the ones he managed to draw from Kame all the time, and Kame savored every second as he flopped backward with a strangled shriek.

"What's goin' on with your buddy? I guess the legends about me are already spreading in the human world, huh?" Kame couldn't tell if the little- or huge, depending on one's metrics- spider was joking or not, and he was leaning towards the 'dead serious' side of things.

Haku choked back a laugh. "Yeah, that's totally it." She knew Hiro almost as well as Kame did, having been there every time the young spider was summoned.

"So what's up, partner? Are you finally gonna let me kick some ass?" Hiro seemed particularly agitated and ready to attack something then normal, which was saying a lot because that was pretty much his resting state.

"No, no, just introducing you to my friend over here. Miriki, this is Hiro," Kame said, gesturing towards his friend who seemed to be gradually gathering his wits back. In response, Hiro immediately bunched up his back legs in a posture Kame knew all too well, and he dismissed the spiderling before the disobedient little thing could jump on the still-shaken Kosuki.

Eventually, Miriki got himself together enough to respond. "Why? Of all the animals, why spiders?"

"Because-" Kame narrowed his eyes. "Wait, are you arachnophobic?"

"Do you mean, 'am I a reasonable person'?" Miriki replied hotly. "Because yes, I am."

Kame glanced up briefly and saw the sunset, which was enough to make him forget the conversation at hand and let out a deep breath of calm. Haku and Miriki seemed to do the same, and there was another lull in the conversation, during which Kame began folding little kunai in his hands using two pieces of paper each-

But those papers raised a painful memory inside of him. Somehow, and he had absolutely no idea how it had happened, but _somehow_ Grandmother had gotten ahold of his birthdate and she and Haku had pooled their knowledge. They'd ended up getting him a huge supply of origami paper in all sorts of different colors, consolidated inside of one of Grandmother's storage scrolls. He'd spent so many stressful minutes of those last few months folding those papers…

Now he was actively working against Grandmother. If how she'd acted towards the Tanikage previously was any indication whatsoever, she wouldn't let Orochimaru's death slow her down in trying to deal with the Tanikage. _Oh yeah_ , Kame recalled, _she can't, because apparently the Tanikage's dead_. That 'fact' refused to sit right with him; someone who'd wielded that much power and allegedly been alive for multiple centuries wouldn't just die on their own. Was it possible that Orochimaru hadn't been-

 _But then how did Orochimaru die?_ He knew that one, or thought he did, because he'd be very hard-pressed to forget that attack of the Tanikage's that had stretched for kilometers on end and seemed to be even more effective than the dust release. Everything in that cone hadn't just seemed to have been broken down, it seemed to have been reduced to _nothingness_ , in a display of power that Kame had flat-out given in to. Possibly even more terrifying was the casual ease with which the Tanikage had been throwing around attacks like that, attacks that threw meteors and moved too fast to even detect. The Tanikage had shown an ability to simply manipulate his chakra at will, to create whatever he wanted with whatever changes of nature-

 _Wait_. The Tanikage's chakra had been combining natures, like when he'd thrown out the lava meteor with earth and fire release. All of the two-nature-combinations had been catalogued; as the last two (spark and gravity) were the rarest as they were found only in children of people with very specific kekkeigenkai themselves. Kame racked his now-significantly-less-anxious brains to remember the _triple_ nature combinations, a much rarer thing to even see; besides the dust release of the stone and Hoshikage-exclusive plasma release of the star, kekkei tota were totally unresearched.

With that in mind, seeing the Tanikage use triple-nature-combinations might be Kame's only chance to see what they'd be. _Okay, he teleported with 'Swift' release… wasn't that one wind, earth, and lightning? Uh… 'Force' was earth and lightning too, with water instead of wind. Wasn't there one more? Oh yeah, 'Crystal'. Earth, wind, water_. To be completely honest with himself, Kame knew that these thoughts would likely never amount to anything, but he had a craving for understanding of the world around him that was fed by them. In addition, any line of thinking that took him away from further worry about the Tanikage was a welcome one.

The little kunai he'd folded together in his hands joined the other two stuffed in his pocket and he began work on a fourth as the silence of their walk dragged on, until Miriki decided to take another crack at breaking it. "So, where are we going exactly?"

"What?" _Oh, shit, I never-_ "Uh, we're going straight for one of Orochimaru's bases and hopefully destroying it once we get there."

"Didn't you guys… I don't know, already destroy a base in the Land of Rivers?" Miriki would know, he'd been there when it happened.

Kame considered for a moment and realized that Orochimaru's general rule of one base per nation had been broken in the Land of Rivers. It made a sort of sense, actually, to have more strength consolidated near his strongest opponent. "Yeah, it's weird that-"

When they rounded the top of a hill and a tiny village came into view. Kame realized what had been irking him earlier with a small gasp. This road was one he'd been on before, one time, on his first real mission, accompanied by Haku and Hiretsuna.

"Ah, shit." He looked towards Haku and she'd evidently seen it too. "Uh, can we… damn." There was no way they'd make it to the second, much further south base from this place, and the population of the Land of Rivers was _very_ sparsely spread out. They likely wouldn't be able to find a town other than this one, and Kame _really_ wanted to sleep in a warm bed…

But these villagers were ones that he'd wronged. With a sigh, he turned towards the other two to voice the bad news and found only Haku there, because Miriki had accelerated around him just as he'd turned and was now a good distance down the road. "Come on, you guys!"

Kame ended up getting distracted by that shout and somehow managed to let some of the villagers catch a glimpse of him. He wasn't far away enough at this point to hope for them to not recognize him, and recognize him they did with a very mixed bag of reactions ranging from dismissive to outright hostile. _Damn it, Miriki, why did you have to do this_ , he thought as he set his mouth in a hard line and grudgingly moved forwards in pursuit of his teammate.

That slow pace actually grew _slower_ as he got closer and closer to the village and noticed the array of mixed faces either sneaking glances at him or sometimes just staring. He ended up stopped a good twenty meters or so outside, unwilling to enter, and remained there when Miriki came barreling back out with a familiar-looking boy in tow. "Hey, Kame! Haku! This guy says he knows you two!"

"Uh…" Kame shared a look of mild panic with Haku before returning the shout: "You could say that. Can we please just le-"

"It's you!" The boy ran over to Haku and Kame with gratitude etched into his face. "Thank you, thank you _so much_ for helping me and Mitaka when that fat bastard came into town."

"I punched you," Haku said in a slightly dazed voice, and then shook herself out of it and blushed. "Ah, wait, no, I mean I'm glad that… ugh."

Kame took over for her. "I'm happy that you remember that, but we're really just passing through-"

"No! Come on, it's getting dark, I'm sure Mitaka's father will give you a room!" The boy was enthusiastic as he grabbed Kame and Haku, tugged twice on Haku to no avail, and then gave up and just pulled the physically weaker (and probably lighter) Kame along with him towards the inn. When confronted yet again with evidence of his lack of strength, Kame blanked out for a moment, which gave the farmboy enough time to lead him into the tavern itself.

Inside, he was met with a much different sight than last time; without Hiretsuna there, the place was flush with happiness and life. Dim lightning seemed to only make it _more_ welcoming and the entire place was warm from food and people alike. Most of the tables and bar seats were occupied, but at Toka's request two groups slided one seat to the side and expanded a two seat gap to a four seat gap. Next thing Kame knew, he was sitting down on a stool beside Toka and Haku, looking into the eyes of the same barkeep who Hiretsuna had assaulted.

"Ah." His protests died in his mouth as he gave in and let himself accept the offer. _What's the worst that could happen_ , he reasoned. _They report us? We're technically villageless shinobi at the moment, so nothing will come of it. They attack? We'll get warned and I kind of feel like I can take on all the civilians in this town by myself, if I'm being honest_.

"Oh, it's you two," the barkeep said in a conversational tone while facing their little group of four. "I hope you don't mind if I say I'm glad to see you got rid of your… 'burly' friend."

"He-" Kame wasn't exactly sure how to respond, but the disgust flaring in the man's eyes led him to an answer that was at first intended as an olive branch but ended up ringing with truth in his own mind as he delivered it: "He's dead, killed by his own acid."

"Good riddance." The barkeep's rising spirits raised Kame's confidence in his answer. Although, the more he remembered, the more he realized that he didn't need that extra confidence. Memories of little comments towards Haku, 'accidental' acid attacks that nicked Kame and her, and countless instances on missions where he'd attempted and sometimes- despite Kame and Haku's efforts- _succeeded_ in doing things like he'd tried to do here all killed any loyalty Kame had towards the dead man.

In fact, Kame realized he'd hit upon a gold mine because it was also highly effective in killing any lasting doubts about Orochimaru that he held. Whether the Sannin had been right or justified about the Tanikage was a little bit easier to ignore when Kame looked at the things Hiretsuna had done in his name over the years, and armed with this new weapon should he ever mentally falter, Kame looked up to the barkeep with a smile. "He was a bastard, but now he's a dead bastard. What do you have, food-wise?"

"Good question," the man responded, before listing off various options for food and drink. Kame asked about prices but was met with "No need, you gave my daughter something priceless," an answer that he couldn't challenge for fear of putting a price tag on his daughter's right to safety. He, Miriki, and Haku all ordered, the latter showing some restraint in the amount of food she requested that confused Kame before he realized that she probably didn't want to push the man too far when he'd already committed to giving them the food for free.

The smile faded into the kitchen, and Kame didn't even have a full second to think before Toka was tapping him on the shoulder. "So," he began awkwardly, "What's going on? I heard the Hidden Valley got destroyed, but no one's really _explained_ anything to us yet. Was it the Hidden Leaf?"

"What?" Of all the possible culprits for Toka to suspect, the Hidden Leaf was not one that Kame would have guessed in a thousand years.

"The Hidden Leaf!" Toka nodded eagerly, seeming surprisingly childish for his apparent age of about eighteen or nineteen. In fact, he almost reminded Kame of… "All the travelers coming through haven't denied it, and it seems right, because the Leaf is in charge now!"

"Huh?" Kame was lost in an odd detail he'd noticed, gradually becoming more and more convinced of it.

"The Valley is gone, so the Daimyo has started using Hidden Leaf ninja now. They come through this town sometimes- by the way, what's going on with you two?"

"Huh?" Kame asked in the exact same mildly distracted voice.

Toka seemed to be happy for the opportunity to start talking about ninja matters with more knowledge than he should possess. "You stopped wearing your Sound headbands, and Orochimaru's dead, same with the Sound Ninja Four, so-"

"How did you know that?" Kame snapped back to reality enough to question why a civilian would know Shinobi Union intel.

"Like I said, the Lead Ninja come through, and the ones upstairs right now are… What are you doing?" At the information that there were Leaf ninja upstairs in the same building as him, Kame briefly gave in to his instincts and leaped to his feet, only dropping back into his chair once he reminded himself that he wasn't _technically_ a missing-ninja anymore. "Anyway, the ones upstairs told me that, but they didn't know who destroyed the Valley."

"Ah, okay." Kame looked over at Haku and Miriki, who didn't seem to want to contribute to the conversation other than listening in. Miriki met his eyes, then opened up another one of his trademark smirks and spoke.

"These two are under probation, and I'm their commander at the moment. I'm re-educating them on how to become better shinobi at the moment, in fact." Somehow, Miriki timed that statement perfectly so that the food arrived and derailed Kame before he could deliver an angry denial. _How does he do that?_

"Makes sense. I traded with another ninja for last year's bingo book… you two were missing-ninja, but now I see; you're going back to being normal shinobi?" That bingo book comment, along with his clearly ridiculous and self-taught display during the last altercation, sealed the deal in Kame's mind.

 _This guy's a shinobi geek, isn't he_? While Kame didn't want to push the subject or comment publicly, he was fairly certain in his conclusion. His mind was taken off that new development when Mitaka, the girl that Hiretsuna had threatened, came walking out of the kitchen holding a platter of food and smiling widely.

"Hey, Toka!" She smiled and dropped the meals off before the people who'd ordered them, then went a little more serious when she addressed Kame: "I just want to say, thank you _so much_ for what you did for me. If you and Toka and your friend hadn't stepped in, then I don't know-" she faltered in her expression of gratitude when Miriki interrupted her.

"Hey there, babe, but you can direct all official messages through the comman-"

He choked off when Haku forcibly wrapped an arm around his head, stifling any further comments and allowing Mitaka to return to her original focus, although not before shooting a confused glance towards the minor struggle. "Uh, I guess I just wanted to say thank you."

Kame wanted to reply with 'You're welcome' but that seemed like it would come off as pretentious. Instead he opted to nod and hope that the dip of his head hid the flushing he could feel spreading through his cheeks, digging into the food.

The rest of the night went amazingly well. Toka actually knew enough second-hand knowledge about ninja (that he was _more_ than willing to share) to enable him to hold a conversation with Kame and Haku. Their 'Who Would Win?' debates were so entertaining to him that he seemed to be happy just listening, occasionally interjecting with some interesting detail or expressing his surprise.

Eventually he confirmed Kame's theory: he'd always wanted to be a ninja, but his parents ran a farm and he was their only child. Ultimately he'd settled and gotten engaged to Mitaka, and although he was completely happy in his choice, he wasn't above wondering about what might have been. Kame, for his part, was also more than willing to entertain him in discussions and stories from his times as a ninja, doing his best to glaze over his time as a missing-ninja for the most part. When he _did_ bring up the spider trials, Miriki expressed discontent: "You had the hots for a _spider_?"

Kame wasn't about to let that one slide, so he made a decision that may or may not have been a warranted one and summoned Kumokafu right then and there in the tavern. The loud noise and cloud of smoke drew quite a few stares, and a few of those stares lingered overlong on the suggestively proportioned and clad seductress, who was back in purple-hair-purple-eyes mode and looking at Kame annoyedly. "What is it, darling?"

Haku, who'd already seen Kafu before but only once or twice in the form that resembled her, looked at Kame and lightly mouthed, 'Darling?' Miriki, on the other hand, spoke in an outraged voice that was even louder than normal: "Why are you able to summon adult Hakus? And why is that one calling you 'Darling?'"

Kame winced, internally cursing viciously both at Miriki for somehow lacking tact despite his charisma and at Kafu for appearing in that form, as he'd asked her several times not to. Kafu turned and sized up Miriki, then whistled and blurred a little bit until she was a different person; thinner, more graceful, and with dark hair and eyes that seemed annoyed. "This more up your alley, hon?"

"Huh." Miriki nodded and appraised Kafu's new appearance. "Alright, alright, you know your stuff. What say we head upstairs and-"

"Try again in a couple years, babe." Kafu grinned, reverting back to her default state with the red hair and eyes, shifting to an idealized body and crossing her arms. "What's the deal, darling? Don't tell me you called me here just to wow Mr. Charisma over here…"

"No," Kame said, feeling foolish now that the minor high of showing off had worn off. "I'm really, _really_ sorry, this was stupid, you can go back." He dismissed the jutsu, hoping that she didn't take it personally and go on strike; as he'd learned painfully after dispatching her to distract a particularly ugly and perverted gate guard. She'd done her shimmering transformation, ended up as an actual child with cat ears, and promptly refused to go through it and ignored his summoning attempts for a couple days.

The discharge of chakra in the inn must have been enough, or maybe it was the distinctive noise that chakra constructs usually made when destroyed, because an upstairs door was pushed open and a Leaf chunin darted down the stairs. When they stopped to appraise the situation, Kame met their gaze, and upon seeing his Allied Shinobi Forces headband they simply nodded and returned to their room.

That in and of itself was novel, and Kame took what was most likely an unhealthy amount of joy out of being seen by a legal shinobi and _not_ attacked. Unfortunately, that joy was crushed out of him by the iron grip of Miriki's next question: "If that woman… thing… whatever… turned into what I liked most when I looked at her, then why did she come here looking like- oh, Kame, you-"

"So how much is a room!?" Kame all but yelled the words at the innkeeper, at this point relying on sheer volume and pretending that he hadn't heard Miriki's words as his only two defenses against a _very_ awkward conversation.

"Ah, well…" they quickly began talking prices and Miriki didn't push the subject, so the evening was brought to an end when Kame secured a fair-priced room with two beds and hustled the other two up into it. He bid a goodbye to Toka and Mitaka, nodded to a chunin guarding the door of the Leaf shinobi, and then dropped his pack down for the night and got ready to argue with-

 _Nope, nevermind_. Miriki had, of course, taken one of the beds. Kame waved Haku over to the other bed, feeling vaguely guilty over the Kafu appearance issue and hoping that might distract from it, and then spread out his bedroll and sat down beside it. It was still a bit early for him to go to sleep, so he did an exercise he'd been practicing for the last few days and folded a small paper butterfly, then attached two small chakra threads to it. With those two threads, he attempted to get it airborne through careful flapping of its wings and nothing else- this particular trick had been recommended by Kumoningyo, who he'd gone crawling back to after his discovery of just how difficult it would be to use Emperor, as a good way to build chakra control.

In those short days, he'd managed absolutely nothing because the upward and downwards flaps would simply cancel each other out. However, today he made a little bit of progress- by carefully shifting the chakra threads slightly towards the outer edges, using tension to keep the wings straighter, he was able to generate a little bit more lift on the downwards flap, and then by moving the threads inwards slightly, he allowed them to bend more and thus be weaker on their upwards flap.

Of course, it was still a far cry from success- a few inches off the ground it simply tumbled back down- but it was something. Kame would have taken it as a sign, had he been the sort to believe in things he couldn't see, but as he was it was simply a promising prospect; just the icing on the proverbial cake that his day had been. After going from despondent, sure that he'd be joining Haku in death, to be granted a chance at freedom and reunited with Miriki was-

He froze as the soul-rending presence of the tentails flooded the room. _No! Shit!_ He turned his head to face Haku, was was kneeling on the bed but bent forward and with arms planted on either side of her. Her face was strained, eyes wide open and tiny black points poking out of the sides of her irises, but Kame couldn't gather up the will to do anything, because with this much proximity to the… _thing_ within her his mind simply shut down.

Thankfully, she had more courage than he did and, with a gasp of effort, quashed the invasive tentails presence. Kame looked over at her but ended up catching Miriki's eyes; the Kosuki seemed to be just as horrified as he was. Haku let out a long breath and dropped herself backwards onto her bed, arms and legs spread and eyes gazing up towards the ceiling.

In the end, Kame was the one who asked. "Haku, what just happened?"

"I…" she bit her lip and didn't look down towards him on the floor, staring straight towards the wooden boards of the roof for seconds on end until finally responding in a voice that Kame recognized as similar to the purely apologetic one he'd used towards Miriki. "Guys, I'm- I'm sorry, I lost it for a second, I thought that maybe I could…"

"Were you trying to talk to the tentails?" Kame asked, before seeing Miriki giving him a frantic hand-across-throat signal while shaking his head. _Was I not supposed to…?_ That question was answered when Miriki reacted to his warning being ignored by throwing up his hands in disbelief and rolling his eyes.

"I…" Haku was speaking almost breathlessly. "It won't happen again."

"Okay, screw it," Miriki grunted, seemingly giving up on the 'don't talk about it' thing. "Haku, you can't hide stuff from us, okay?"

"I have it… I have it under control," Haku all but whispered.

"I don't even need any kekkeigenkai to see that's not true."

Where Kame would get defiant under questioning, Haku simply turned more and more inward and defensive. "I can do it. I'm strong enough to keep it sealed, I just… I tried to see if I could do more."

Kame realized that she'd probably tried to use her kekkeigenkai, which had led to a fraction of the tentails' power getting let out. "Why-"

"I'm not going to watch someone come towards you, ready to kill you, and just sit there and see it happen." Haku's voice had regained much of the emotion it had lost, now swelling with repressed despair and a hint of something else. "I had to see the Tanikage just walking towards us, and I knew… I knew… if Grandmother didn't come," she said with increasing speed and emphasis, "-Then I would have had to _watch you die just like I watched_ -"

And then she stopped her talking just as quickly as it had started, having sat up into a position with crossed legs somewhere along the line during her speech. Kame was lost in the revelation that everything she'd just said, he'd felt, and realized in a burst of thought like one of his paperbombs detonating in his brain that she'd been just as caught up in protecting him over the last few months as he had been with her.

Then, with this new line of thinking he recognized one final similarity: the slight sag in her shoulders and the slight strain in her voice that were the same ones he'd had every time she'd comforted him during their trials. That covered-up unhappiness was reminiscent of one other time, though: that night where he _hadn't_ seen it, and it might have cost her her life had Gaara not covered for his failure. Kame would be damned if he was going to let that ever happen again, so he swept up onto the bed next to her and did his best to give her the same supportive embrace that she'd given him whenever he'd needed it most during their trying times together.

When she returned it, arms going back aroung his shoulders and pulling him in close, he was relieved to know that he'd done it right. It wasn't much, but… it felt like one more little piece of his redemption being added to the pile, and for once Miriki didn't say anything at all, so Kame could savor the moment while it lasted.


	45. Arc 5 Vol 2: Bad Omens

The morning had initially seemed to be going reasonably well until Kame had poisoned one of his only friends. After waking up and insisting on paying for their breakfast and room, Kame, Miriki, and Haku had taken to the road towards their final destination. They had about half a day's walking ahead of them and their infiltration was to be conducted at night, which meant they'd have to find some way to kill three or four hours, so Kame decided that they may as well take a slow pace. The reason he'd vocalized was that they could conserve energy, but there was another one that he only now decided to start.

"Emperor." Kame's stating of the name of his puppet when he summoned it wasn't exactly a learned or traditional habit, but all the jutsu he used, expenditure of chakra made him itch to say _something_. Both Haku and Miriki briefly looked at him but then shot their eyes over to the chakra smoke, and then- never having seen it before- froze and gawked at the three-meter titan now looming in the middle of the road. They went from that surprised state to actually flinching when Kame threw out ten chakra threads to the points he knew to be designed to accommodate said threads, and then gave a few simple and experimental bends of the limbs.

Emperor, with all its complexity, required Kame to use both of his hands, ten separate chakra strings. A masterful puppetmaster like Sasori might have been able to do it with less, or Kankuro, but Kame was far from their level: a novice like him required use of multiple strings to literally move around their puppets, which limited their capacity to perhaps three simple puppets at a time. Skilled puppetmasters, who were significantly rarer, could control up to ten puppets by using strings from their fingers to command and manipulate them rather than hauling them around, allowing up to ten puppets for ninja like Lady Chiyo and Kankuro.

Sasori had surpassed even that- by skipping his fingers altogether and throwing chakra strings directly from his heart to the puppets, he was able to control a hundred puppets at the same time. To be honest, that feat boggled Kame's mind, because the sheer level of mental strain required to micromanage one hundred puppets at the same time, dealing with threats and going through combat with each one, was ridiculous.

Kame could barely manage Emperor, and calling what he did 'managing' was a stretch in and of itself. With strings on the puppet's lower legs, upper legs, and main body, he could awkwardly begin marching it down the road but not much else, sparing a moment to reassure his two comrades: "Don't worry, guys, I'm just practicing with the puppet."

Miriki shot him a dirty look but nothing else came of it and soon they were on their way again, Kame gritting his teeth a little bit… _Okay_ , he admitted to himself, _this is harder than I thought it would be_. Walking came naturally to him; replicating those specific leg movements on a huge, stiff puppet was a whole different story. After thirty meters or so, Kame had already been forced to desperately avoid it falling over by yanking its body to the right or left with his chakra threads no less than eight times.

 _Okay, maybe graduating to Emperor after lifting up a butterfly one time was a bad idea_ , he conceded mentally, preparing to put the larger creation back into its scroll-

"Man, you aren't very good at that, huh?" Miriki's tone was one of amused smugness that had an accompanying but unspoken message: 'I knew you couldn't do it.' "Just when I thought you might be able to use an actually cool puppet, too."

Those little comments immediately killed any plans Kame might have had of accepting his inability to use Emperor. Instead of desummoning it into the scroll, he gritted his teeth and focused in, putting one of Emperor's legs in front of the other. _I'm not going to admit defeat to a puppet or to Miriki_ , he told himself in defiance against the growing frustration. The next hundred meters or so went by with seven almost-incidents. _Progess_.

Unfortunately, when Haku noticed something to the side of the road and darted across to check it out, the very careful and slightly improving balance he'd established with Emperor was completely shattered. It was an unfortunate time to learn that Haku's chakra void was able to destroy his chakra threads upon contact, and an even worse time to see that those newly-snapped threads were detached from a rapidly-tilting Emperor puppet. To complete the trifecta, Miriki happened to be standing in front of them and turning around gradually, which wouldn't have been a problem if it weren't for Kame's frantic toss of all ten chakra threads in an attempt to save the armored puppet from crashing onto the ground.

All ten threads made contact, but it only took one that strayed up to the back of Emperor's neck to create disaster. That particular point was the activator for one of the weapons, which promptly spat out a barrage of poisoned senbon right towards Miriki.

"Ow! What the hell- oh, you son of a…" Miriki's voice died out and he dropped into a sitting position, dazedly swaying a bit.

Kame dismissed Emperor without a second thought and immediately ran through every plan he could think of. _I didn't carry the plans, so I don't know what kind of poison it used on those. I don't carry antidotes with me, either, and I don't know medical ninjutsu… shit_.

Fortunately, he remembered one particular ally he had that might prove useful. A few handsigns later, the spider-nurse Kumoishi was standing on eight legs in the path before him. Haku didn't react, by now clearly accustomed to the spiders that Kame had befriended, but Miriki let out a strangled shriek and collapsed from a sitting to a lying position before choking out, "What… the hell…"

"Ishi, my friend got poisoned, can you…?" Kame turned towards the spider.

"Oh, goodness, is this your friend?" Ishi skittered over to the prone Miriki, whose flushed face paled considerably as the huge spider loomed over his head. He spluttered out some unintelligible nonsense that did nothing to stop Ishi from moving a leg over him and tapping him on the forehead once with the end of a leg that glowed with chakra. After a few seconds, she turned towards Kame: "It's a paralytic that won't kill him, but for three day's he's going to… let's just say it's a very bad thing," she finished in an explanatory tone.

"Can you help him?" Kame asked anxiously, trying not to panic.

Ishi bent her front legs and abdomen down underneath herself and began spinning weblike chakra, all the while still talking in that slow and overly expressive voice. "I can help him, in fact, that's why I got picked to be the school nurse! Kids will be kids and bite each other and they needed someone who could make them better again." Kame felt like a preschooler with the way she was speaking, but held his tongue and watched as the ball of chakra and spiderweb was compressed smaller and smaller. "I can fix most poisons, don't be worried to call me if you ever get another booboo- oh, all done!" She held a tiny ball of thread on the end of her front leg, which she raised to Miriki's mouth-

"Ungh…" Miriki turned his head a little bit and seemed to compress his lips.

Kame stepped over so he could meet his teammate's eyes and did his best to conjure up a deeply apologetic voice: "Miriki, I'm really sorry for doing this to you, but if you don't eat that, you might-"

"Rather… die…" Miriki was most likely being a drama queen, but the whole situation was still stressing Kame out immensely.

Thankfully, Haku seemed to know _exactly_ how to deal with this situation- she stepped over, grabbed Miriki's jaw and skull, and forcibly opened his mouth. "That's not very nice," Ishi said, but plunked the ball of webbing in anyway. Kame, for his part, was intensely curious about what it would do, so he activated his cursemark's first stage to sense it, regardless of the minor costs he'd have to suffer and the possibility of needing and not having it later.

Once dropped in, the ball of chakra that appeared to have separate lines of it running through each and every tightly packed thread remained stationary in Miriki's mouth, until Haku covered his mouth and nostrils. Even then, he held out an impressively long time, but eventually gave in and gulped it down. Once it had entered his stomach, something in it broke and then the chakra threads split apart, trailing off down every corner of his chakra network and filling it precisely until every corner had a little bit of her green-glowing chakra, and then it all flashed away.

The first and only sign Kame needed to relax himself as far as Miriki's health went was when he crawled backwards and shrieked. Ishi waved a front leg at him and he flinched, so Kame decided that perhaps it would be better for her to go, saying, "Thank you so much, Ishi."

"My pleasure!" She disappeared back to her realm in a small puff.

Kame steeled himself, turning towards Miriki and fully expecting to be met with a barrage of insults, knowing that he just had to endure them and maybe this whole thing could be forgotten. However, when he saw Miriki's emotionless face, he realized- _He's going to hold this over me for a long, long time, isn't he?_

"So, can we get back to…?" Haku trailed off, but the point had been made and received by both of her teammates and soon they were back to making good time towards the hideout. Kame made the decision to _not_ try and push his luck with Emperor again, so he was left with a few options on what to do with his time.

In the end, he settled on one that might spare him from whatever probably humiliating revenge Miriki was planning for him and tried to spark a conversation: "So… what ended up happening with Keikiro, anyway?"

 _Oops_. He began backtracking, but before he could make any ground Miriki replied in a surprisingly conversational tone. "Oh, it went well. I decided to cut things off and she took it better than I thought she would; it's actually a little bit weird that she let someone like _me_ go without a fight."

"Ah. I… okay." Kame settled on a neutral answer.

"I'm a perfect ten," Miriki continued, seeming to not even have heard Kame's response. "I've got everything- I mean, look at me." _I'd rather not_ , Kame thought. "She's clearly just hiding some kind of deeper feelings that she can't accept at the moment, but it's okay, I'll let her wait," Miriki said, now verging on creepy territory. "I'm obv-"

"Hey Miriki, you said Senshiko was pregnant yesterday," Haku said, expertly managing the impossible feat of getting their Kosuki teammate to stop talking about himself. "Who's the father?"

"Deihaka-sensei," Miriki said like it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Kame choked on air and had to cough for a few seconds, his inability to speak giving him time to really absorb the news… which, to be honest, was for the most part happy. _That means that the dad didn't get caught in the Hidden Valley, and-_ "Wait, Miriki, what happened with you guys? Why didn't you get… in the Valley, you…"

Miriki shrugged. "Out on a mission, _clearly_."

Ignoring the sarcasm, Kame was just glad to get a straightforward answer from him for once. He was just getting a _tiny_ bit annoyed with Miriki, but the threat of all that overwhelming guilt returning to him was more than worth smiling through a few jokes.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

When they finally neared the base, it was dark out and a perfect time to make their move (they'd stopped to train for an hour or two during the walk). Kame stopped his two teammates and began in a serious voice: "Okay, they'll most likely let me and Haku in, but Miriki, you're going to have to stay-"

"Not happening." Miriki crossed his arms, smirking. "Letting you two walk into an enemy base, _alone_ , is a direct violation of my orders from the Shinobi Union."

"Bullshi-" Kame shook his head a few times. "Dude, this isn't a joke."

"I'm coming in with you two."

Their battle of wills was short-lasted as Kame decided very quickly that he didn't want to fight the Kosuki boy on this particular subject and instead turned towards the base. _If stealth isn't going to work_ , he thought, _then I should scope out_ -

He caught a glimpse of the base that he'd exited before the attack on the Hidden Valley itself took place- or what was left of it. In his mind's eye, he could see it as it had been; a tunnel network carved below the lowest point of a small depression, stretching far underground, with potent illusory and physical defenses in place to keep the entrance hidden. The depression, once a seemingly natural part of the rolling hills, was now deeper.

Much deeper.

In fact, the entire area was now a crater at least ten kilometers wide that punched a deep hole into the ground. Inside of it, the earth was an ugly scarred mass, devoid of anything living and scorched barren. Orochimaru's base and everyone inside of it had ceased to exist at this point, tunnels and halls wiped off the face of the earth; but at the moment that was somehow the least of Kame's worries.

His gut twisted as his paranoid mind began insistently bringing up the one man he'd seen who was capable of this much raw devastation. He remembered those purple eyes, glowing with power and looking at him with a cold surety, and did his best to stop remembering as soon as possible, which was made difficult when Haku slid up beside him. "Do you think he might still be alive?"

"I…" Kame honestly couldn't answer.

The entire thing was cut short, though, when a dark mass began moving towards them from out of the sky- a huge crow, coming straight at them with purpose and clutching some sort of object in its claws. Now, normally this would have sent Kame straight into a mental flurry of battle plans and tactics, but Miriki's earlier illusion of a creature coming from the sky coupled with the revenge ploy that Kame had been expecting made him fairly sure that this was nothing but a trick. "Come on, Miriki, do you really think you can-"

The crow slammed to the earth with massive feet and crushed the solid-packed earth underneath with massive talons. Kame was knocked backward by the sheer force and realized- possibly a bit too late- that it _was_ in fact a real threat. By then, Miriki had already shot him an incredibly confused look and then turned towards the foe, speaking in a challenging tone of voice: "Who are you and why have you come here?"

It turned its head in the way that birds did and gazed at them with a huge, glassy eye. Kame grew more convinced by the second that it did not understand speech, and turned towards his friend with just a hint of retaliatory derision in his tone: "What are you-"

"Give me your stuff. Everything you have on you, now." The six-meter-tall crow spoke in a squawking, raspy voice. Each movement of that massive and seemingly _very_ sharp beak reminded Kame of just how easily the bird could tear them limb from limb.

He looked up into those dark, dark eyes and trembled just the tiniest bit, but kept his resolve, unwilling to just give up all his belongings at the word of this creature: "No. I don't want to hurt-"

A blast of wind came flying forward from the crow's wings, seemingly missing Kame entirely but sending both of his teammates flying off into the trees. Another flap, and a barrage of black feathers punched into the trees around his prone friends and the ground around his feet. Before he could even react, one massive foot slammed into him and pinned him to the ground, and then it leaned over him and gazed at him with that black eye and spoke once more: "Your money or your life, and make it quick."

"O- Okay," Kame stuttered, reaching over to the straps on his pack and preparing to ditch it. He had some valuable things in there, but none more valuable than his own life.

That was when the world around him broke apart into a thousand fragments and he was back where he'd been seconds before, standing in the forest beside Miriki and Haku with everything still intact. _What?_ The crow, now spreading its wings and focusing its gaze towards Miriki, nodded once. "You're a decent fit. Here," it said as it rolled the object from earlier over towards Miriki's feet, "Take it and sign your name in blood."

"Now, normally I refuse anything that involves signing and blood on principle," Miriki chuckled, as Kame noticed what was now right before him: a scroll, just like the one that Orochimaru… had… _oh my god_.

"Is that a summoning contract? But why the hell… who…" Kame was unable to formulate real words, because he was a little bit rightfully distracted by the surreal things happening right in front of him. He finally settled on one question that, while petty, was also truthfully the most burning one in his mind: "Why Miriki?"

"Hey!" Miriki shot him a dirty look. "Why _not_ me?"

The crow clacked its beak, drawing their eyes back onto it. "Kid, your name is Miriki, yeah?" Miriki nodded. "Miriki," the crow started, dropping the weirdly informal squawk for a more practiced, measured tone, "-The contract of the crows has been passed down for generations between wielders found worthy; masters of mental warfare-" Miriki shot Kame a smug look- "-and deception, who keep a close hold on what is theirs at any cost."

After a short quiet period, Haku pitched in thoughtfully: "So, he saw through that genjutsu and refused to give you his stuff?"

Kame was no expert on crow body language, but if he had to guess, Haku's question had affronted the massive thing. It responded back in the grating voice that somehow came off as untrustworthy just from hearing it, almost like whatever he said was sure to be a scheme of some sort: "When Itachi bit it, he never picked someone to inherit the scroll, and that snake creep Orochimaru got ahold of it. Fifty friggin' years later, someone destroys his lair, and boom! The scroll gets sent back to our world, I get picked to find a new summoner."

"Okay…" Kame had several questions still burning away, but one of them came out even though his mind was telling him it was probably a bad idea: "But why _Miriki_?"

"Oh, come on," Miriki let out in annoyance. "Why would I-"

"Doesn't matter now," the crow squawked, "-It's a done deal." Kame looked down to see that Miriki had indeed signed the unrolled scroll in his blood, officially contracting himself to the crows. "Bite your thumb, get your spider-ey teammate to teach you the summoning jutsu, and call us just about whenever."

And that was that.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

"The next bases we could go after are the Fire and Rain ones," Kame noted. They were sitting in a small camp, discussing where they would go next. "The Fire one is pretty well-defended, but the Rain…" he shivered a little bit at the memory of that particular Hidden Village, and more specifically at the thought of being an enemy caught by its eerie shinobi..

"I actually think the Rain is the better one to go after," Haku argued. "It's the one that can defend itself the most, right? If word gets out that the bases are being destroyed, then they'll send-"

"What do you mean there isn't a hot crow summon!?" Miriki's argument with one of his new crow allies became loud enough for Kame and Haku to wince at it from ten meters away. "Are you telling me the spiders get a sexy-"

"Yep." The crow was clearly unimpressed.

"And also, what was that about 'tribute?'" Miriki sounded all sorts of annoyed, and Kame couldn't resist listening in.

"The crow king wants valuables from everyone below him, and that includes you, kid." This crow also had a sleazy, grating voice that made Kame afraid it was a species-wide thing. "What's so hard to understand about that?"

"But I _pay_ you? Just to have a contract?"

The crow nodded. "Yep."

They kept at it, but Kame took a moment to think back on how he'd been put off by the eccentricities of the spiders and laughed. It would appear that the crows, too, came with their own set of problems for their summoners to solve. _Is every single contracted species like this?_

"Kame?" Haku's question snapped him out of his thoughts.

"Huh? Oh, uh… what about the base in the Land of Wind?" Kame remembered going there once or twice, although Orochimaru for the most part had avoided sending him or Haku there; whether it was motivated out of a fear that they might turn traitor to him or a desire to avoid putting them through fighting their old comrades, Kame didn't know.

"That… yeah, that's better," Haku agreed. Now that they were legal shinobi, Kame realized that they technically had nothing to fear from their Sand brethren. For the seven months it had lasted, his time as a missing-ninja had done an impressive job of ingraining fears about legitimate village shinobi in him, or maybe it was his own personal tendency to overthink and agonize about everything that had happened, was happening, or would happen to him, ever.

"One hundred thousand ryo," Miriki stated firmly.

"Two hundred thousand," the crow replied with equal intensity.

"One hundred fifty thousand ryo, and you guys work on getting that hot girl crow." Miriki's tone was clear; this was the last offer.

The crow considered for a moment, then nodded. "Done."

Miriki nodded, dismissed the crow back to its home, and then approached the little area where they were camped out. "Okay, good news is I'm officially a henchman of the crow gang, bad news is I just realized that I can't pay them out of my clan's pocket any more."

Kame leaned back into his bedroll, shaking his head slightly. "Alright, we're going for the Land of Wind base tomorrow."

Miriki made a small noise of discontent before finally responding, "You know that we can't-"

"Yeah, I know." While the rules set forth for them by the Shinobi Union had been relatively loose, there were a few of them that were specific and ironclad: no being away from Miriki for more than three hours at a time, or else their seals would detonate and kill them, and no entering a legitimate ninja village, or their seals would detonate and kill them, were the two ones that Kame had impressed into his mind.

In an attempt to bring up morale, Kame counted off ' _Wind, Earth, Rain, Waterfall, Bears, Lightning, Water, Whirlpool, Fire, and Sound_ ' in his head and then proclaimed, "Only ten more bases… to…" That definitely didn't do what he'd intended; such a mounting goal of no less than ten strongholds, all in different countries, was far from a cheering thought.

"Oh, shit." Miriki sounded incredibly upset, and while Kame's statement hadn't been a happy one, it certainly hadn't warranted _that_ strong of a negative response. "Damn it. Can we get this done in, say, less than two months?"

"I…" Kame blinked in confusion. It would take nearly a month just to travel through all those bases, so finishing them all in two would be… actually, it might be doable. "We can try…?"

"We should _do_ ," Miriki said. "I just realized I promised boss Rasudoro a monthly payment that I only have enough for _one_ of, so we gotta get this done quick."

Kame rolled his eyes. "Damn it, Miriki, didn't you think to check your wallet before you agreed to paying so much?"

It was hard to tell in the darkness, but Kame could have sworn that he saw a flash of white teeth curved in a smirk. "Didn't you think to check the road before you _poisoned_ me?" Just like that, the argument was over.

Kame sensed a strong likelihood of that specific comeback making many, many appearances over the next few weeks.


	46. Arc 5 Vol 3: A New Plan

**(A/N) Veterans' day weekend, and my family member decides to take my computer with him to Philadelphia, so I was unable to write anything from Thursday morning to late afternoon today. Sorry for missing two update days and for the short chapter; I'll try to make up for it in the coming week.**

The Land of Wind base was one of Orochimaru's least active ones, and by extension one of the weakest-defended. Carved into a solid stone monolith, it was the only base with a single entrance, and therefore the best target to attack first without risk of people escaping and spreading the word about their true loyalties. Kame, Miriki, and Haku were looking from a distance, standing in the desert sand and analyzing the situation as best they could; while Kame could pick out the one specific butte that contained their end goal, the guards within would most likely not be able to pick him out in return.

"The only way in is from the top," Kame said as he turned over to the other two. Haku probably already knew that, but thanks to Miriki's obstinate refusal to stay outside, he'd just have to be included in whatever plans they made. "It's also the only exit, so we should watch it in case anyone… you know."

It was a sort of unspoken rule that they didn't go into details regarding what they were about to do. Kame found it hard to justify things when they were put into words, but as long as he just kept his eyes focused straight ahead, there likely wouldn't be any issue. "Also, the ones inside probably don't know that we're not with them anymore, so they might just let us walk right up."

"Okay, but how are we going to justify _me_ coming along then?" Miriki certainly wasn't making it easy for Kame to accept his inevitable presence, even coming in with a challenging tone.

Kame tried to think of ways to work around the issue. "We could pretend you were a prisoner?" Miriki only shook his head. "Okay, what about you use illusions to make yourself look like another Sound ninja?"

"Do you have any pictures of Sound ninja?"

Kame had to admit he had a point. "Fine. We could say you wanted to join us?" That idea actually sounded like a good one; it wasn't very suspicious for them to bring along an old teammate they'd 'turned' to their side.

"Yeah, sure," Miriki said glibly.

Haku contributed her question in a worried tone: "Once we're in, then what? If any of them escape, the rest will know what happened and be afraid of us."

Kame set his mouth in a line. "Then we have to make sure none of them escape, and leave no survivors." The confidence with which he said that shocked even himself. "But then… Miriki, can you watch the entrance to make sure-"

"Yeah." Miriki seemed shaken, slightly dropping the casual confidence and entitlement when he heard Kame's brutal declaration. That reaction, coupled with the declaration itself, was what ultimately killed their conversation; it was with heavier hearts than before that they approached the butte

As they neared it, Kame realized that last time he'd awkwardly swept his emotions under the rug he'd paid the price, so this time he stepped back and faced them- or, to be fair, crushed them was a better descriptor. It took a more digging than he'd thought it would to bring the memories of Orochimaru's wrongdoings to the surface, but surface they did. As much as he'd tried to ignore them before, in that moment he could clearly see the terrible experiments, kidnapped people, and assassinated innocents. By the time they began to climb the butte itself, Kame's doubts were all but gone.

The base's occupants were either very hopeful or very incompetent, because they didn't make any attempts to attack or contact the approaching party until Kame was all but standing over their door. At that point, they started relations with about what he'd expected, surrounding the three genin by rising from the stones in a loose circle and then the lab-coat-wearing one in charge barking out a few orders: "You're surrounded, Kame and Haku."

Kame took a second to channel his inner Orochimaru, and then stared the head researcher down and spoke in a commanding tone: "And why is that?" Apparently not realizing that the question was rhetorical, the man tried to respond, but Kame interrupted him. "Orochimaru may be gone, but that does not mean _you_ are receiving an increase in rank. Unless, of course, you think it would be a good idea to challenge me?"

 _Oops_ , Kame thought, as the researcher's eyes lit up and his hands moved to make signs. _Guess I wasn't intimidating enough, this might go badly_. He reached for his own kunai, but before he could grab and throw, a stream of fire had already erupted forward from the researcher's hands. _Shit!_

Haku moved faster than Kame, his foe, and even the fire itself, blitzing underneath it and surging forward with a fist to the man's gut. He was sent flying back ten meters, which would have left him injured but conscious had the cliff's edge not been about eight meters away. Instead, he missed his desperate reach towards a handhold and plunged straight down the fifty-meter drop. There was no accompanying crunch or thump of impact, but his loud shriek being suddenly cut off was enough for Kame.

Just to make sure, Miriki stepped over and craned his neck, looking down towards the rocks and sand with a wince before saying, "Yeah, that one's gonna leave a mark."

Out of instinct, Kame glanced over at Haku with worry, forgetting the same way he always did in the moment that this was far from her first time killing someone. Just like the vast majority of those other times, if what she'd just done affected her at all, she didn't show it. The other followers of the head researcher, in a demonstration that was far from unexpected to see from anyone under Orochimaru's sway, simply bowed their heads and backed down. One of them, presumably the second-in-command, nodded and spoke: "Welcome back, Kame and Haku."

 _Okay then, the plan's back on_. Kame nodded and stepped towards the entrance, starting into a semi-planned stream of questions. "All right, are there any operatives from this location now active at the moment? Who has taken control of the Hidden Sound as a whole after Lord Orochimaru's fall? Are Grandmother and Himei's locations known?"

"Uh…" The man laughed uneasily, but Kame couldn't tell if it was fear or distrust that caused his voice to waver. "I think…"

"Don't think, answer." Speaking in an authoritative tone, Miriki purposefully moved to stand inches away from the uneasy man, staring directly at him until he broke and backed down. When he spoke again, the hesitation had been replaced by the sort of deference previously directed towards Orochimaru.

"Right, sorry. I'm Tenshi, the second- no, first-in-command here now, and I'll be happy to answer your questions, just follow me," he said, leading the way until he stood over the entrance itself, then laying an open hand down onto it. The circular section of stone slid away to reveal a round hole leading down into darkness, with a set of handholds and footholds carved into the side of the rock. Kame kept a careful eye on where he was going as he did the same, noting that Haku and Miriki were also proceeding behind them.

It was actually a very short climb until Kame's feet were rested on stone floor and he was surrounded in the same stone tunnels that he'd been within for months. The seemingly damp yet not wet walls, floor, and ceiling were all familiar enough for him to start feeling more confident, or at least confident enough to act his role and give orders: "Tenshi, right? Answer my questions, now."

"Sorry, uh… Grandmother is in charge, now. She's been keeping things running just about the way they were all along, except we're not to leave the base on missions anymore." Tenshi was still walking down a new set of stairs, leveling out into a curved hallway as he kept talking. "Obviously, we haven't sent out any new missions because of that. Himei, I…" he trailed off in a way that reminded Kame of himself when he'd have to deliver bad news to Orochimaru. "I don't know anything about him, Grandmother didn't mention him at all."

By now, they'd reached a longer hallway with doorways lining the sides. "Well, here're the living quarters. Will you be staying here for the night, or- wait, nevermind. I forgot to mention, the reverse summoning seals are out of order and have been since Orochimaru died. I assume that you'll be staying at least the night here, then?"

"Maybe." Kame needed to consider the relevant information before deciding what the next move should be. He waved the man off, stepped into the empty room, and mulled it all over: _Okay, if everyone's been recalled from operations, then dealing with them all is going to be significantly easier. This base is vulnerable from… wait, what is this base, again?_

He realized that he'd only been to the Land of Wind base sparingly, and each time had been quickly in-and-out. Haku had lain down onto the bed and somehow _already_ fallen asleep, despite it only being midday, so Kame turned towards Miriki to make sure-

"Yeah, I'll guard her." Miriki sat down on one of the other beds.

Kame nodded gratefully and then stepped back out the door, stifling the urge to glance both ways down the corridor which would most certainly look suspicious, then began to move towards a staircase that he knew was there off towards his left. Most of the bases had special purposes beyond the basic necessities; like the one in the Land of Fire where Orochimaru tested new weapons and jutsu. The Land of Wind one had never come up, but that in and of itself was odd…

So Kame made his way around the base, nodding to Sound ninja that he passed as he scanned through the levels. A quick activation of his cursemark's first stage let him get a good feel for the various people inside the base, as well as rough outlines for the floors based on various scrolls and other ambient seals put into the walls. It all seemed to be about what he'd expect, with the exception of the bottom floor, which had an incredibly bright seal that was familiar yet not quite something Kame had seen before…

He excused himself as best as he could and marched down a few more flights of stairs until he was directly next to the source of the power signature, which was even more bright up close. He was in a room that seemed to be empty, dusty shelves with nothing on them lining the walls and cobwebs littering the entire place. The seal was underground in the middle of the room, and he moved over it and focused in on it; with proximity came greater detail and he was able to see that it was a seal that he was indeed familiar with: a paperbomb. This particular paperbomb had a huge amount of chakra stored within, not anywhere near as much as the sixtails bomb had but definitely enough to destroy the entire base.

It was a good thing he made sure to scour every inch of it, because that was when he noticed that the triggering receiver, which for most bombs was on a timer, contact, or detonation signal, was keyed to go off if it was tampered with in any way. _What is this thing_ , Kame wondered, _and why is it designed to keep out even Orochimaru's underlings?_

He considered blowing open the floor and hopefully destroying the seal with it, but that wouldn't work; any damage to it would simply set it off. Still, with his curiosity driving him further and further, he refused to give up and entered his second state, allowing him to freely move his chakra around and even into the floor itself. _I'm going to have to be super careful about this_ , he told himself, _but if I can just…_

The chakra he sent out was directed towards the small line in the seal that connected the triggering portion to the actual explosive. One quick jab, and it was over- that line had been broken, which sent a signal back to the triggering matrix, but the triggering matrix no longer had a way to set the bomb off and flashed away ineffectually. Kame breathed a small sigh which turned into a gasp when the floor clicked and began to sink into the ground. _What the hell…?_

Once it stopped moving, Kame found himself in a new and tiny room the size of a closet, with the walls lined in shelves that held scrolls and books of all types. A few seals dimly lit the area, but one spot in particular was lit more brightly than the rest, bright enough to write and read on. It was a wider opening that served as a desk and held unfinished notes on it, written in the neat and machinelike script of Orochimaru himself.

When Kame got closer and looked at the notes, he had to read them several times before their meaning sank in. _Upsides: Resurrection time decreased by half, recuperation period also greatly shortened, body modifications retained. Downsides: ineffective on bearers of stronger cursemarks, targeting chosen randomly_.

The notes were on a scroll labeled 'Resurrection Pt. 5', which Kame quickly read the rest of, his heartbeat growing louder and louder in his ears with every word that he registered. 'Resurrection Pt. 4', '3', '2', and '1' were all devoured equally quickly, and by the end of it Kame was breathing heavily, his mind racing at the new information even as his hands shook slightly, dropping the scroll to the floor.

' _Orochimaru can't die'_ was the first coherent thought he was able to conjure up, but after it came a flurry of other and more rational ones. _The cursemarks aren't just for power and keeping his underlings loyal, they're also for bringing him back if he dies. The latest version that he wrote down was one that'd take thirty-three days to complete, and he died nine days ago, so in twenty-four days he's going to resurrect- which is to say, one of the people that he cursemarked is going to die and become his next body_.

Kame couldn't let that happen. If Orochimaru were to come back, then he'd have to fight him, which would end up in the most predictable outcome: one dead genin, and one very alive Sannin. Hands still quivering, he ransacked the other cabinets of scrolls, sorting and putting the useful ones into his own backpack. The room seemed to house all of Orochimaru's sensitive research, the sort that needed to be kept for future reference but could also spell doom for the Sannin should the wrong people find it.

 _I guess I'm the 'wrong people'_ , Kame reasoned. He grabbed one final piece of paper that had an interesting seal on it; a number that was apparently keyed into some running total that Kame wasn't skilled enough to identify. After that, he kneeled down and inspected the seal at his feet, locating one more important segment that raised and lowered the floor he was on, and activated it to raise himself slowly back up to the level of the floor above.

He swallowed when it all _really_ sank in: _I have to kill all of Orochimaru's underlings in twenty-four days, or else… he's coming back, and he's going to kill me and Haku_. Armed with that purpose, he found it a little bit easier to do what he did next: sending out his chakra in a rough approximation of the sealing he did with his ink, attaching a timer to the broken end of the explosive that would activate in half an hour.

He climbed back up the various sets of stairs, nodding but paying little attention to the Sound agents around him, before finally sliding into the room with Haku and Miriki in it. Miriki looked right at him, while Haku took a little while longer to wake up and then do the same at the sound of his voice. "Guys, I think we're done here. We have to go, now."

Miriki looked like he intended to put up a fight, but then narrowed his eyes and spun them into a Hatogan state before nodding grimly. "Okay."

Haku glanced at Miriki, then back at Kame, and rose out of bed slowly. "Uh… alright."

They gathered what they needed, dropping by the storage for some supplies, and then went to leave. Kame was dreading a confrontation with Tenshi, but none came, and they left out the single entrance without any fight whatsoever. In fact, they'd made it almost back to the point where they'd first stopped to scout out their target by the time that Kame's parting gift finally triggered.

A blast of heat ripped through the air and flattened all three ninja onto their faces, and a few fragments of sand and broken rock pelted the area around them. When Kame turned around, it was to lay his eyes on what was left of the base: a smoking crater, charred and broken. He noted that there was no longer any chakra signature coming from the area, and Miriki confirmed his theory with a simple, "That's that, then."

"What…?" Haku seemed confused.

"I left a bomb inside the base," Kame informed her, and then felt a tiny flare of chakra from his pocket. The flat piece of paper that had previously read 892 now read 821, and Kame realized that it was a way for Orochimaru to track possible resurrection recipients. Those 71 lost numbers were actually people, the occupants of that base who were now ash scattered to the winds.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

The situation with their base in the Land of Rain was horrifying. Not because of any destruction left behind, or monstrosities turned loose, or anything like that. No, the Land of Rain base was off-putting to Kame on the simple basis that it had no evidence of having been attacked at all, yet somehow every living soul inside was gone.

In fact, the people manning it, who had presumably been alive and counted in Orochimaru's total mere days before, were now all very, very dead. In lines and all on their knees, they formed rows of corpses in the central hall of the base, and all showed mild signs of having been in fights but nothing serious or life-threatening. However, dead they were, and not a scrap of chakra remained in their bodies.

Miriki excused himself due to the smell almost immediately, and Kame and Haku left fairly quickly after that, although Kame took a bit of time to strategically scatter paperbombs around the small outpost base. When they left, he made the detonation sign, and a series of explosions prefaced the hill that contained the base itself collapsing in on itself and burying all evidence of a base having been there in the first place.

 _Three 'down', eight to go_ , Kame thought.


	47. Arc 5 Vol 4: Progression

For the entirety of the long, long journey through the wet and dull Land of Rain to the deeply forested Land of Waterfalls, Kame had yet to see a single shinobi. The Land of Rain was a desolate wasteland, so even civilians hadn't been around there, but the Land of Waterfalls was devoid of any life as well. They passed an odd village or two, with scared residents ducking away from sight and keeping at the edges of Kame's vision, clearly afraid of the foreign shinobi, but there was no sign of any other ninja at all, Waterfall or otherwise.

The base that Orochimaru kept in the Land of Waterfalls was one of the larger ones, used to hold a majority of his fighting forces, because of its relative impunity towards the Shinobi Union while inside the Land of Waterfalls. It would probably be the most difficult to deal with, but Kame decided that their best chance was to infiltrate the base, spread and disguise paperbombs, then destroy it all at once. That would only work as long as their loyalties remained unknown, so that made the Waterfall base the clear priority.

They were making good time, perhaps egged on a bit by the impending moment of Orochimaru's resurrection that Kame had informed the other two about, so they still had twenty days left when they reached their destination. _We might actually sleep here tonight_ , Kame thought as they approached cautiously towards the cave that held the base within it. _If we can just… just…_

 _What the hell?_ Kame narrowed his eyes and forwent caution as he darted over to what appeared to be an injured Sound ninja, lying on the ground, oddly posed in a pool of blood that only seemed to be growing. As he neared the man, he noticed one more crucial detail: a thread, punching through the ninja's stomach and trailing off into the darkness. A quick check revealed a slow but steady pulse, and yet not unconsciousness, just an inability to move for some reason. On a hunch, he made a few handsigns: "Summoning Jutsu!"

Kumoishi puffed into existence and took the situation in before tapping on the immobile Sound ninja a few times, then turning to Kame. "What can I do to help you, Kame?"

Kame pointed towards the still figure at her feet. "Why isn't that guy moving?"

The spider did her thing, tapping a slightly-glowing leg on the person's forehead, then considering for a moment leading up to a declaration: "This poor man is paralyzed from a stab wound in his gut. I can remove-"

"No, that's okay, thank you Ishi," Kame said as he waved her off before she cured their enemy. "I appreciate the help, you can go back whenever you want."

"Oh. Are you sure you… okay." Kumoishi disappeared in the same little puff of smoke, leaving Kame to mull things over, which took a lot less time than it normally did given the mounting evidence towards something dreadful. Still, he soldiered forward with a defensive stance, waving the other two forward as he approached the base's interior and noting the string that stretched into another collapsed Sound shinobi, and another, and another.

By this point he knew what was going on; all that remained to be done was confirm it for certain and then get out of this place. Stepping over one bleeding body after another and glad that they didn't seem to be able to register his presence, or at least weren't able to show it, Kame finally ended up walking through a doorway and narrowly avoiding tripping over that one long thread that was swallowed up in the darkness.

"Sutetchi." When Haku spoke from just behind him, it startled him into half-jumping and sent his heart pounding like crazy. After taking a moment to calm himself, he nodded in response before continuing the careful progress deeper into the base. _I don't think Sutetchi would attack us…_

 _Wait, I thought Sutetchi was dead_. Somehow that simple fact had eluded him so far, and the realization that someone who was meant to be dead had literally strung up countless Sound ninja all around him and was presumably continuing his grim task in the darkness ahead of them sent Kame's instincts screaming at him to walk away.

However, he did his best to silence the inner demons and kept putting one foot in front of the other, motivated in part (a larger part than he'd like to admit) by not wanting to show fear and weakness in front of Haku and Miriki. As childish and nonsensical as that instinct was, it also refused to go away, so Kame's feet remained carefully stalking forward and his hand gripped tighter around his kunai.

They were helped in part by the thread, because as the main path branched off towards tunnels labeled as food and living quarters, the string bent in and then back out from those doorways, meaning Sutetchi had been in and out from them already. Just to make sure of the situation, Kame activated his cursemark, but narrowed his eyes in annoyance; the base had been constructed to hide large numbers of people and the chakra signature dampening seals carved into the walls made his senses' range stretch only about twenty feet.

In those twenty feet he noted a couple of immobile and slightly suppressed people down the hallways they passed, but the thread, glowing with a reddish and corrupted chakra, simply kept going. It was then that Kame heard the first couple shouts and clatters of metal against metal, yet those sounds lasted only seconds before a few thumps and then silence reigned yet again. At this point, Kame felt his hairs standing on end and pushed every sense he had to the extreme, wondering what would happen should Sutetchi see them.

 _He wasn't hostile to us before_ , Kame thought, _but now he's attacking the Sound base? I guess… the Rain might have been the ones who destroyed the old Rain base; maybe the smaller villages in the alliance are turning against the Sound while Orochimaru's not there… still, I don't think Sutetchi would attack us, right?_ As if in answer to that question, he subconsciously gripped his kunai a little too tight and it began shaking slightly along with his wrist.

At that point, they reached the main hall, a massive cavern that Kame had seen hundreds of ninja gathered in. It was also the most brightly lit part of the base, which cast the grisly display within in an even starker light, one that made Kame's heart skip a beat. Bodies of Sound shinobi littered the floor, some with cursemarks active and some without, but all connected by that same cursed thread that stretched all the way out of the base. It was almost mesmerising to see the geometric patterns created when the fallen ninja were linked together…

Kame shook his head a little to clear it and refocused on the scene, noticing now the skirmish still going on at the far end nearly sixty meters away. At that distance, his chakra senses were no longer operational, and his eyes failed to pick out enough detail to accurately report what was happening, but his mind filled in the blanks. One small, dark figure (Sutetchi, most likely) was flitting around some other slower and larger ones, dispatching them in straight lines two or more at a time with clean strikes. As Kame drew nearer, he could see the additional threads rippling out from Sutetchi, deflecting attacks or incapacitating enemies all around him.

"Guys, come on!" One of the larger cursemarked Sound ninja roared, "He's down to six lives, we can just- ack!"

The rallying cry was cut short when something vital was pierced by one of Sutetchi's stabs, replaced by a short gurgle and collapse. The other few remaining Sound ninja went quickly, and soon it was just Sutetchi, standing alone in a field of unmoving bodies. _I guess that's that_ , Kame thought morbidly, _he did our job for u-_

The Stitching Blade made it inches away from Kame's face before Haku knocked it aside and planted herself firmly between the now nearby Sutetchi and his target. Kame fell backwards, far too late to save himself had the blow connected, and then yelped, "No! Stop!"

Sutetchi faltered briefly, breathing heavily and lowering the blade a little bit. Kame remained cautious, knowing all too well the speed with which that weapon could be brought back to bear against him, and did his best to think of a way to appease the clearly out-of-his-mind First Acolyte. Of course, all that came out of his mouth was, "How are you alive?"

Somehow, that ended up doing the trick for the moment. Sutetchi straightened all the way up and looked at the three genin with disdain bordering on disgust, before speaking dismissively: "Tch. Jashin's chosen do not enter his realm in such an artless way."

Kame had a brief moment to wonder what that meant but quickly got sidetracked by the look of intense distraction on the Waterfall ninja's face. After several long seconds of deliberation, Sutetchi finally turned back to the three genin and spoke once more, this time with the tremulous tone of rapture. "You are honored to stand and witness my greatest gift to Jashin…"

 _Oh, no_ , Kame thought as he realized what was going on but didn't know whether to stop it or just let it happen. The decision was made for him when Sutetchi kept going: "Lord Jashin, purveyor of this realm and ruler of the next, please accept this sacrifice in your name and grant these cursed souls a better existence."

At the end of his speech, he plunged the dagger into his own chest and Kame gasped as that dark, corrupted chakra in the thread flared up all around him, blinding and suffocating in its intensity. For the tiniest snippet of time, he felt the full presence of something awful, something greater than his comprehension could understand, and knew somehow that it was evil beyond anything he'd ever seen, ever dealt with, ever thought about.

And then it was gone, and Sutetchi was crowing in triumph as countless new stitches appeared on his back. "My greatest gift to Jashin yet… I felt him. _I felt his presence_ , and it was glorious!"

Kame's chakra senses that had been overloaded slowly returned enough for him to get a decent grasp of the area around him and confirm it that everyone around him was dead. He brought out the piece of paper secured in his pocket to see that it had gone down from 816 to 607. _Two hundred and nine people, dead_.

A cynical part of him was just glad that it hadn't been his hand doing the killing.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Two more days' journey took them to the edge of the base in the Land of Stone, an outpost used for Orochimaru's experimentation. Unfortunately, something had gone wrong, because their initial approach had been right into a trap that forced them back and out. Kame wasn't sure if they'd been attacked because the jig was up, or just because they were trespassers, but either way the people in that base weren't allowing them in.

That meant open warfare, but thankfully Kame knew exactly how to deal with that. This particular base had a rear exit, a tiny tunnel disguised behind illusion with a guard watching over it at all times. After a short planning session, Kame, Haku, and Miriki were approaching, Miriki's hatogan taking care of the guard's eyes. Once they were inside, Haku darted up the side tunnel that led to the guard's post and dispatched him before he could do more than yell for half a second.

After a short regroup period to make sure that no one was acting on that yell, they kept going. Kame moved forward through the tunnels, laying down paperbombs every couple meters and making sure to be thorough as possible. The first guard they encountered didn't see them, as Miriki tricked the man's vision and Haku slammed him into the wall hard enough to knock him out instantly. Kame just kept laying down the bombs, one after another.

The next few guards went much the same way, but then they came across a living area stocked with people all eating meals. It wouldn't be reasonable to assume they could sneak past all those people, but that left them with two other options: bluff it out, or retreat. With three dead guards, retreating would only leave them in a tougher position in the future, so Kame winced as he realized what he'd have to do. "Miriki, Haku, cover me if this doesn't work, okay?"

Before they could clear the disbelieving expressions from their faces and stop him, he gathered a trivially small amount of chakra and… "Clone Jutsu." The Kame copy strode out into the mess hall, letting its presence be known to everyone inside. There was quiet for a few seconds, and then one of the Sound researchers spoke for the group:

"Kame? Are you still alive? How did you get in here?"

 _Well, that answers the question of whether they think I'm a Shinobi Union agent_ , Kame noted. He dismissed the jutsu and stepped out to talk face-to-face, responding to each of the questions in turn. "I am Kame, I'm still alive due to Grandmother' escape jutsu going off wrong, and I got in here through the secret back entrance."

"I… understood. Do you wish that Grandmother be notified that you are alive?"

"I'll…" Kame coughed, unsure of what excuse he could give for not wanting Grandmother to know he was alive.

Miriki stepped in like an expert. "Have you all honestly not been notified that Kame is alive? He's checked in with several other bases since I joined up; being that out of the loop is a little embarassing."

In one smooth stroke, he'd introduced himself as another servant of Orochimaru and solidified Kame's position. The various scientists and shinobi went back to whatever they'd been doing, except the for the leader, who approached until Kame waved him off. Now accepted by the ninja, Kame knew that he most likely had less than an hour until the missing guards were reported unconscious, so he had to move quickly.

He walked out into the stairwell, deciding to fully lay the paperbombs in another area during whatever meal time this was and then laying them in the room once all the people left. Dropping down a floor, Kame noted Miriki following along but Haku remaining to do… something. All too aware of the stealth and time involved, he decided to keep going, laying down another line of paperbombs in the passageway leading to the storage chambers…

"Kame!" He turned quickly to see Haku darting over to him. "Kame, listen. They got rid of almost all their prisoners, but there's one last kid here, the only subject-"

"Subject… oh, no." Kame realized that he'd been about to detonate a base without considering the innocent people locked inside, all of Orochimaru's test subjects. He was shaken out of the inevitable flurry of self-blaming and bitterness by Haku, who literally grabbed him by the shoulder and shook him a little bit.

"Kame, did you hear me? There's a kid in here, we can't destroy the base with a kid in it," Haku said firmly. Kame wished he had that kind of moral surety.

 _No_ , he told himself, _I do. I'm not going to kill an innocent child_. With that in mind, he nodded towards Haku. "So, how do we get the kid out?"

"First, we have to get her." Haku nodded down the hall. "She should be in one of the cells."

"Okay." The three genin fanned forward, picking through the various cells one after another until finally, Haku was the one to find their target, calling them over. Kame moved beside her to look into a darkened cell, but within there was a small form curled up in a dirty bed.

"Hello?" Kame wasn't exactly sure how to proceed.

Haku was, as she activated two breaths and then slammed a fist straight through the door's locking mechanism. The loud shriek of metal caving against her hand startled Kame, but the kid remained fast asleep on their little bed. The second challenge was the chain attaching a collar on the child to the wall, although 'challenge' was a bit of a misnomer, as Haku tore the chain apart with her bare hands and then picked up and slung the kid over her shoulder.

When they stepped back towards the staircase, Kame got a better look at the child and sucked in a breath- it was a little girl, perhaps five or six, with ragged red hair covering their features and clad in only a filthy white shift. His blood boiled at the thought of her being trapped in the dungeon, which brought out a much more visceral and angry response than he'd thought it would.

Rather than think about that any more, though, he stepped in front of Haku and Miriki before they could start up the stairs. "Guys, we have to think this through. We can't go back through the base with Haku carryin-"

"I can't believe this, are you seriously suggesting we leave a little girl here?" Miriki glowered at Kame.

Kame took a deep breath before responding with a fair bit of vindictiveness: "No, I'm suggesting _you_ carry her since you're the least useful in a fight."

"How dare yo-" Miriki paused his accusation and then shrugged. "Actually, yeah, you're right. Hand her over, Haku."

Haku nodded and gave the litte girl to Miriki, who clearly struggled more than Haku had with the weight of the child over his shoulder but was also clearly capable of moving around and operating. After that, they were off, the unconscious girl occasionally murmuring gently. The first enemies they encountered, Haku blitzed almost immediately and dropped with a barrage of blows. Kame activated his second stage and kept a swarm of paperbombs at the ready in case he needed to use them, but for the most part, he didn't.

Haku laid into the various enemies like a vengeful demon, showing absolutely zero mercy in her attacks and leaving a trail of unconscious or worse Sound ninja in her wake. In an open battle, she might not be so effective, but the combination of restrictive corridors and the element of surprise made her short assault on the base unbelievably efficient and deadly. Kame laid more paperbombs in the wake of the fighting, keeping his senses ready for any possible traps or sneak attacks, but mostly just watching Haku do her thing with slight awe.

Disaster struck when she went back into the main room. They must have realized _something_ was wrong, because when she entered she was met with a flurry of lightning jutsu. Kame hoped that she'd dodge back into the corridor, but seeming out of instinct, she shot a hand up and began to absorb the chakra with her… kekkeigenkai…

 _Shit, shit, shit_. Kame couldn't do much more than sit there and hope as she finished up consuming the lightning, finally putting a voice to his fears: "Haku, no, don't do it."

She turned to face him with the spiralling eyes, but they held more compassion that bloodlust, and the tentails' presence was somehow more restrained than it had been before. "Don't… worry, Kame. I have it… under control."

Then she flashed out of view in a burst of lightning, followed by a few cries of pain or anger and a _lot_ of crashing furniture and walls. When Kame stepped into the room, Haku was standing in the middle of it, crackling lightly but seemingly getting a handle over the tiny fraction of the tentails' power that she'd let out. The people who'd laid in wait were sprawled all over the room, each in a destroyed patch of terrain that they'd been pounded into hard enough to leave a crater.

"Remaining personell, evacuate through the rear entrance," Kame heard a voice broadcasted throughout the base yell. He shared a look with Haku, then with Miriki, and then the three of them bolted for the front entrance and got out of the base in a very short order. Kame, who'd laid bombs at the foundation layer and all through that rear entrance, tried not to relish it too much when he made the correct handsign and sent a wave of explosions through the large hillside. When they climbed to the top, Kame saw that the exit had been destroyed, though the base as a whole remained standing.

 _That's fine_ , he thought, preparing himself for the chakra signatures he sensed turning around. The first couple of Sound ninja came out the front with cursemarks in full power, only to step onto his minefield of paperbombs and be destroyed almost immediately. One of them survived, only to be punched by Haku and sent flying into the trees, then pursued by her just in case he made it through that as well.

A few more stragglers came out in sporadic bursts, but Kame, situated over their path and able to sense them coming as he was, had very little difficulty taking them out. Every time he began to feel a pang of remorse, he glanced over towards the painfully thin little girl that Miriki was holding and lost any pity for her captors.

When all was said and done, the signs of life from within the base were all but gone, and Kame dropped into it with another set of paperbombs he'd drawn up and destroyed it completely. They made camp not far from there, and Kame noticed Haku laying her tattered coat over the ground and giving the girl her blanket to form a makeshift bed. After they ate the supplies recently taken from the Land of Wind's base, they went to sleep under the stars, with Miriki's crows watching the area for them.


	48. Arc 5 Vol 5: Flower Power

**(A/N) I'm not entirely sure what the stretch of land between Waterfall country and Sound country is called or who it belongs to, but I'm proceeding under the assumption that it is/was unclaimed territory. If I'm wrong, please tell me.**

Kame slept in again, and after spending the whole night fitfully waking up and seeing his two teammates and their rescued charge fast asleep, it was confusing when finally woke up for good to see them all wide awake and moving about. Miriki was making breakfast while Haku appeared to be comforting the little girl, and Kame couldn't help but listen in on their talk.

The girl was rubbing her eyes, out of sleepiness or sadness Kame couldn't tell, and speaking softly. "I don't… I don't 'member."

Somehow equally softly, Haku responded with concern. "Do you know where you were before the bad stuff happened?"

"I don't know, I was… there were people like mommy and daddy, but then-"

The girl's voice started to fluctuate and Kame could see the breakdown coming, but Haku wrapped an arm around her and stroked a hand through her hair, shushing her. "Shhh… it's okay, it's okay, it's over now."

"I want my mommy and daddy." Thankfully, the girl seemed slightly calmer now, demanding about her parents in a begging voice rather than a crying one.

"We can find your mommy and daddy soon, okay? Can you remember anything else about where you're from?"

"I don't 'member." The girl shook her head and looked down at the ground.

Haku glanced over towards Kame, noting that he was awake, and then patted the girl's head a few more times. "Are you hungry, Tandoki?"

"Mhmm."

Miriki seemed to finish up whatever it was that he was making, presenting them with… a mixture of destroyed ration bars and rice, held in plastic containers. Kame gagged a little bit at the sight, and was about to launch into a complaint when Tandoki yelped and tumbled over to the food in a tornado of red hair and brown cloth. She dug in with a wild hunger that hurt Kame's heart a little bit, squeaking out, "My favorite!" between bites of the grey and white mush.

 _Wait_ , Kame thought, narrowing his eyes, _what!? Is she looking at the same…_ And that was when he saw the stars in Miriki's eyes and the slight sag in his shoulders, which made the truth clear- _He's using genjutsu to change the taste, smell, and sight of it…_ he thought, strangely touched, and then a little bit more selfishly: _Why didn't he do it for me and Haku?_

Once again Miriki displayed that off-putting ability to guess at Kame's thoughts as he said, "I'm not gonna spend a bunch of chakra on _you_."

Kame decided not to take offense, because judging from the look of it and from Miriki's previous limitations, he might very well not have enough chakra to spare to do all that. His tactical mind was annoyed at that thought, but the emotional half watched a starving little girl eat like her life depended on it and told the rational parts to shut up.

He ate his own cold and mushy meal, as did Haku and Miriki, in silence for the most part that was permeated only by occasional attempts at conversation, all of which failed. Kame took the moment to really examine the little girl and noted her deep-red hair, which belonged to only one clan that he knew of: the Uzumaki. That gave him a starting point, but it wasn't even close to enough to go off of; the hair might be a latent inheritance from two recessive genes happening to line up, meaning that she could be from literally anywhere. The majority of the Uzumaki were gathered in the Hidden Whirlpool now, but going to the Whirlpool would be difficult with the girl in tow and might lead nowhere.

He took one second and only one second to chuckle at the fact that in all of one night, his priorities had shifted so intensely. The first thing on his mind was finding a place for this girl to go, and that place absolutely couldn't be with him, Miriki, and Haku. He worried about what might happen should the Sound send people after them, so with a heavy heart he managed to turn to the group and ask, "Should we take her to the clos-"

Before the suggestion of finding a nearby orphanage could leave his mouth, Miriki's hand was over it. "Not now," he said with narrowed eyes that made Kame realize his mistake- _Even if we end up doing that, telling the girl that we're going to abandon her is wrong_.

"Okay," he said, feeling dirty about concealing their conversation from Tandoki but also knowing that it was probably for the best. "We don't have long before… you-know-who comes back. If we go straight all the way to the Whirlpool, then we might not have enough time to stop him."

Tandoki didn't look up at all, but Miriki crossed his arms in annoyance and strode out towards the edge of their camp. Kame followed, moving beside the Kosuki until they were both out of earshot from Tandoki, and then listened to his harsh response. "If we ditch her with civilians, there's no guarantee that they're gonna be able to get her home at all. _If_ her parents are still alive, she might not see them ever again."

Kame bit his lip as he was torn between warring instincts to protect Tandoki from the harshness of their world and to protect her from the world outside. "But if we take her with us, she's gonna be in danger. We can't split up, the seals will go off, so what do _you_ suggest we do?"

Miriki sighed. "We just take her with us for now, and move through the next few bases quickly. If we run into any trustworthy ninja, we can hand her over, but I don't think we have any other choice but to keep her close."

' _We can't'_ was Kame's immediate reaction, but after thirty-odd seconds of inability to think of anything besides that plan, he conceded enough to just shake his head. The straw that broke the camel's back was seeing Haku listening to some story of Tandoki's with rapt attention, doing overexaggerated reactions to every little twist and turn of her tale. It was silly, but split as he was, the final thing in favor of keeping the girl safe and with them was the sight of Haku getting along so well with her.

"Okay, fine." With nothing else to say, Miriki and Kame made their way back and began packing up. The next base on their hit list of sorts was the one in the Land of Bears, a multiple-day-long hike away and stocked with Orochimaru's _prisoners_. While most of the bases had containment cells, the Land of Bears' stronghold was essentially a jail for people Orochimaru considered too important to kill or let go.

Kame had been thinking and continued to think as they set out, Tandoki sitting on Haku's shoulders and seemingly haven forgotten for the moment all about whatever hardships she'd suffered. With the added difficulty of a child they might have to watch, Kame had to rethink their situation and what move they should make next, so he did just that through the long and silent early hours of the walk.

The seals that they'd received were the largest restrictor for them in almost every way. If Kame were to come within a few miles of a major village, the seal would destroy his heart; if he were to move more than about half a kilometer away from Miriki, it would destroy his heart (with the notable exception of travel to Uebu Abyss, which seemed to confuse the seal as long as he stayed there); if anything were to tamper with or damage it, it would destroy his heart. Those limitations were a huge issue as far as Tandoki's safety went, because unless they ran across some kind-hearted and absolutely trustworthy ninja or civilians, they had no way of letting her go.

The other rules he had to go off of were the hard deadline of seventeen more days, after which Orochimaru would be back and most likely seeking bloody vengeance against Kame. The thought of just accepting that flickered into his mind, but before it could be quashed by his survival instinct it was first quashed by him knowing, deep down, that the Sannin would kill Haku first to hurt Kame. _If we still have Tandoki at that point_ , Kame worried with mounting dread, _he'll kill her, too_. The thought of that wide-smiling-

 _Right, back to the planning_. Kame shelved his hatred of Orochimaru that grew stronger and stronger with each passing day and refocused his mind on what he'd originally been contemplating: their next step. They were currently moving along a road that would lead through the very outskirts of the Land of Rain and into the Land of Fire, a calculated risk that Kame had decided would be better than going through the Land of Waterfalls. Sutetchi could have given them a fair fight and in all likelihood would have killed them, but for some reason he (or Jashin) had decided to spare them as witnesses to his moment of glory.

Kame didn't want to have to bet on that happening again, so they'd proceeded down the southern road instead. The path ahead became visible as they moved past a kink in the road and saw the long stretches of the Land of Earth's brown gradually give way to the grey of the Land of Rain. With a little bit of annoyance, Kame realized that if they didn't want to end up sleeping a night in the unknown danger of the Rain, they'd have to up the pace.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

They'd ended up walking into the night and only setting up camp long after Tandoki had fallen asleep. Miriki's protests of tiredness and that the Rain shinobi 'couldn't possibly be that bad' fell on deaf ears, and they crossed into the Land of Fire with the moon high in the sky before stopping for the night. Thankfully, none of the Rain shinobi ran into them- in fact, they'd passed through the upper regions without seeing another living soul. Even the small outposts presumably set up for defense were unmanned, which was deeply worrisome to Kame, who'd seen the precision of the Rain ninja firsthand.

Kame woke up at around the same time as Miriki this time after a night of relatively untroubled sleep, rising earlier than he'd like but unable to go back to the world of dreams. Rather than tossing over her coat this time, Haku had shared her bedroll with Tandoki, which led to _her_ being the late sleeper this time around as neither Kame nor Miriki wanted to wake the two of them up. Miriki was busy cutting up a ration bar into geometric shapes, probably to feign some other dish and brighten up Tandoki's morning, while Kame sighed and realized that he might as well do some training.

"Hey Miriki, I'm going to go train. I'll be back in… an hour or so, okay?" Miriki glanced over towards him and nodded distractedly, giving a little wave and then turning back to his task.

Kame summoned Kumohiro, his new go-to due to Kumokafu's insistence on using the purple hair whenever she was summoned. The little spider was practically bouncing with excitement, and Kame was immediately met with "This time for sure!"

"What's for sur-"

He was interrupted by the anxious Hiro, who appeared to be looking around excitedly and searching for… something. "This is the time that I finally get to show off my combat skills! Who are we killing, partner?"

 _Oh, that's it_. Kame should really be used to the odd level of eagerness to participate in violence that Hiro exhibited, but every time it took him by surprise. "No one," he said with a sigh, "I just need you to have Kumotensai take me to Uebu Abyss, okay?"

"Oh, come on. Look, there's a little human over there, she'll be easy to-"

On the other hand, _that_ was too much for Kame to brush off. "No. Don't even think about trying to hurt her, she's just a kid."

"I was just kidding, jeez." Kame wanted to protest that he couldn't read spiders' expressions or tones of voice well enough to identify when they were joking, but realized that at the end of the day Hiro was just a kid too.

He proceeded with a calm tone, "Sorry. Can you please have Kumotensai bring me over to Uebu Abyss?"

The little spider shook a little bit and then disappeared back to his home. One benefit of Hiro being his messenger was that he either took the job seriously or just like to run, but either way the result was that he could tear across the webs in a third of the time it took Kafu and Kame only needed to wait thirty seconds before he felt the yank on his chakra network pulling him across the world.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

"Chikamatsu Monzaemon was first to hold contract of spiders, and learned all puppet jutsu from spider teachers. He was talented student, able to control ten spiders at once, but did not come even close to surpassing spider mastery of puppetry." Kumoningyo's voice droned on and on as Kame walked the spider puppet around the webbing to wherever the mild glow of chakra directed him.

This exercise was for building attention span and mental flexibility as well as plain old mechanical skill, and consisted of him walking the puppet around the web- which he was now decent at- to the places that Kumoningyo's chakra lit up as target locations. After learning to walk the eight-legged puppet, he'd made an attempt at doing the same with Emperor, only to find out that apparently two legs were significantly more difficult to deal with than eight. The balance necessary to move the armored titan around proved to more than make up for only having to deal with the legs.

When informed of this, of course, Kumoningyo had decided that he needed more finesse and multitasking ability. Finesse was something he exercised on his own, with the paper-folding and flying that he'd gradually been making progress at, but multitasking, she had decided, was going to be something she taught him.

Enter this exercise, in which she lectured to him about some aspect of spider, puppet, or ninja history and he did his best to listen along and retain the information. He normally would have been elated and listened with rapt attention, but the problem was he also had to maneuver the spider puppet around on the web where each footfall, if misplaced, could prove disastrous, and even beyond that she was also telling him where to go with little light signals.

All in all, he was mentally stretched very, very thin and every passing moment where he didn't end up accidentally missing a step and causing the whole balance to fall apart was a miracle. A miracle that ended when Kumoningyo snapped out, "Stop." Kame did as she asked, halting the puppet as she tapped a leg repeatedly against the ground. "Kame will tell me, who did Chikamatsu Monzaemon give the contract of spiders to?"

"Uh…" Kame briefly considered trying to guess, but his indecision was all that Kumoningyo needed to see before chittering in annoyance and going on a tirade.

"Kame must pay attention to the outside, not just the puppet! In a real battle, he would be dead from any attack!" The leg began tapping a little more forcefully. "Chikamatsu Monzaemon gave spider contract to second Kazekage Shamon, and- why is Kame not moving puppet?"

Kame whipped around to see that she'd lit up a new patch of web and frantically began moving his puppet towards it, this time dedicating a little bit more brainpower to the lecture going on. "Shamon used contract but wasn't good at puppet jutsu, not good enough at multitasking. He made puppets that moved themselves and didn't need his skills, focused on making puppets more complicated and powerful, and gave away puppet contract to…"

The next forty minutes passed in a blur of Kumoningyo's history lesson, Kame's deep focus split between the nitty-gritty of puppet leg placement, the story of the spider contract and its holders, and noting the directions that he was supposed to march the puppet towards. Unfortunately, when his time ran out, she was just getting to the part where she spoke about Genno. As desperately as he wanted to continue, he knew that the others were most likely all awake and ready by this point, so he raised a hand to cut off her talking and bowed once more. "Thank you, Kumoningyo. I have to go back to my world, now."

"Kame will practice with paper," she replied as she scuttled off down a long thread.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Kame did end up practicing with paper. In much the same way as the last day had gone, the travelers woke up and immediately began their march across the Land of Fire. After the collapse of the Hidden Snow, Hidden Hot Water, and Hidden Sound villages, the Hidden Leaf had simply annexed the lands to its north and now had the largest land holdings of any of the Five Great Nations.

They did end up running into the odd traveler or two now that they were in less oppressive lands, but because the road they were on ran straight from west to east across from one minor nation to another, the encounters were few and far between. Miles went by with them walking in silence-

 _No, that's not true_ , Kame admitted, _I'm the one who's walking in silence_. The air was full of talking between Miriki, Haku, and Tandoki, the latter's eyes wide and sparkling with joy, the same deep red as her hair. Kame was content just being surrounded by the happiness, quietly amazed at how much the sullen little girl had changed in two days' time. It almost made him glad that the very few other living souls they'd passed had been creepy, unresponsive, or both, leaving them little choice but to keep Tandoki with them.

Still, despite occasional participation, Kame for the most part remained detached from the conversation. Even as his hands worked at lightning speed due to stress, pumping out an endless stream of paper shuriken, kunai, animals, plants, and objects, trying to think of a way to take out the Land of Bears' base with a child in tow was a difficult challenge, to say the least. _If we stage a breakout_ , he reasoned, _then… no, we can't. The prisoners will attack us just as quickly, and we can't fight or run while taking care of Tandoki. If we leave Tandoki outside the base, then we could try to fight our way inside…_

 _No, she's in danger if she's alone out there. That also ruins the breakout option, because if any prisoners get out they would kill her. If we leave Haku with her… no, because she can't be far away from Miriki. Leaving Miriki leads to the same problem, which means that if we go into the base, we go as a group_. Kame cursed internally, knowing that taking a little girl into the base, a little girl that Orochimaru had been experimenting on, would lead to discovery and death for everyone involved. The little colorful paper lotus he'd been folding was crushed at the thought and discarded as he got to work on another one.

 _We could go and try to find her an orphanage or something_ , he thought a bit _too_ hopefully, _and… no. That would kill our chances of beating Orochimaru's resurrection, and once he's back he'll come for her again. Shit, shit, shit!_ His beating himself up must have been more apparent than he'd meant for it to be, or maybe it was just good timing, because it was then that Tandoki gasped and squeaked at him: "Comma's flower is pretty…"

"Huh?" Kame blinked a couple times at the apparently awestruck little girl, who was pointing down at his chest. He tracked the line from her fingertip to his hands, which had just finished folding a blue paper flower in bloom. "I… Comma?"

Tandoki pointed at Miriki and said, "Meeky," then at Haku, "Haku," and then at Kame, "Comma!" She giggled in a way that made Kame briefly wonder if she was doing it on purpose, but he quickly dismissed that thought.

"No, I'm Kame," he said carefully, only to be met with an unwavering stonewall smile. "Kah-Mei. Kame," he tried again, this time overenunciating, but her expression didn't change at all. "'Comma' is the name for a…" she clearly wasn't getting it. "Nevermind, I guess I'm Comma now."

Miriki stifled a laugh at that, but sobered up quickly when Kame turned a glare his way. "I'm sorry, _Comma_ , go back to what you were saying."

 _Two can play at that game_ , Kame thought, as he shrugged and responded with equal insincerity: "Thanks, _Meeky_ , I'm glad you found- wait," he frowned, "What was I talking about?"

"Comma flower!" Tandoki helpfully reminded him, which brought out another round of giggling from Haku.

Kame looked down at his hands and the flower, which had a flat square section of paper at the bottom. In a sudden flash of inspiration, he whipped out a kunai and made two precise cuts in short lines, dividing that flat paper into three strips, and then approached the Tandoki-Haku tower. Haku graciously dropped to one knee, allowing Kame to take the ends of some of Tandoki's hair and slip them through the middle strip of paper, then slide the flower all the way up to the top of her head.

"Yay!" Tandoki clapped her hands happily.

"Adorable," Miriki commented, for once without any detectable sarcasm.

Haku smiled at the sight. "Agreed," she said, and Tandoki seemed to grin even wider even as Kame found a second little flash of inspiration and his hands got to work on another flower, this time out of a warm yellow. He made the same folds, creasing it together, and then made the same two cuts, approaching Haku as stealthily as he could and then sliding it up her own hair in one smooth motion.

She turned to look at him, surprised, and then broke out into a grin that rivalled Tandoki's both in brightness and in emotional impact on Kame. He felt oddly elated that he'd caused her to break out in a smile like that, and even her simple "Thanks, Kame" send his heart into disarray.

 _Wow_.

Of course, now that Tandoki saw Haku's flower, she pointed at Miriki and cried, "White!" Kame did as he was ordered, putting together a white flower for Miriki and chuckling at the sight of the other boy's silent death glare, knowing full well that he couldn't refuse it without ruining the moment. When the flower was nestled into Miriki's hair, Kame's chuckle turned into a laugh that ended up being short-lived as the tables turned.

"Red!" Tandoki pointed at him, and he smiled ruefully while folding one last flower for himself. They ran across only one more encounter that day, an old man who grinned at the sight of their group of four all with the little paper lotuses, and for some reason that reaction made Kame feel a lot closer to the other three then before.

When they made camp, Miriki had a long argument with one of the crows who showed up wearing lipstick. Kame was intrigued enough to listen in, and ended up hearing Miriki whining:

"This isn't what I meant! That's not sexy- ow!"

That cry of pain was elicited when the crow slapped him with a wing, and then began squawking at him in a scratchy female smoker's voice. "Excuse you! I'm not some cheap tramp, and I'm not gonna put up with ya if I get disrespected."

Clearly unimpressed, Miriki responded sounding equally annoyed. "When I said 'sexy lady crow' I meant a human!"

"Then why didja saw crow?"

He winced. "Okay, I know it sounds dumb now, but the spiders can do it-"

That statement was met with a gasp and another slap. "The spiders? Who the hell cares about the spiders? They're a buncha degenerate, creepy, nasty… _things_ and I don't wanna hear you comparin' me to one of 'em ever again, ya hear me!?"

Kame noted the hostile reaction to the mention of his eight-legged friends but filed it for later review. Right then he was having too much fun watching Miriki try to deal with an angry crow woman. "Right, I just… whatever." He sounded dejected enough for Kame to start feeling a pang of sympathy until he remembered exactly why Miriki was upset; after which it was hard to feel bad when the cause of all this was trying to get a humanoid woman to summon. "Bye."

Tandoki was a lot different that night. Miriki had trained enough to use his hatogan's sense-alteration nine total times, and as of then all nine of them were being spent on Tandoki's three daily meals. The last two nights, Tandoki had crashed almost immediately, but after a whole day of glee she seemed vehemently opposed to going to sleep. Haku, on the other hand, dropped off almost immediately and Miriki was dealing with the crows, so Kame took up the job of child-caretaker.

"Comma!" Tandoki grabbed him by the arm. "Not sleepy! Tell me a bedtime story!"

Kame glanced around for help instinctively, but nothing was there. As far as reading material went, he had a storage scroll that would summon a sealed box, inside of which he'd stored a huge amount of technical scrolls and data on Sasori and Orochimaru, as well as his own journals and notes. _Somehow_ , he thought with a small roll of his eyes, _I doubt that's good bedtime story material for a kid_.

Unfortunately, his only experiences in storytelling were the storybooks his parents had read him when he was Tandoki's age, the plots to which he had forgotten completely, and the mildly violent fights he'd described to the kids of the Hidden Star and the spiderlings in Uebu Abyss. _Also not the best for a child trying to sleep_ …

Ultimately, inspired by the red in her hair and eyes, he settled on telling her some stories about the Uzumaki clan. Ninja history was something he'd studied enthusiastically, so it was easy for him to get into the swing of things as he narrated the early origins. "Way back, a long long time ago, there was a huge, strong family called the Senju. Now, the Senju had a lot of people, and they were all powerful, so parts of them went off to make smaller families. One of those smaller families ended up in the Land of Whirlpools, and they were called the Uzumaki…"

In the end, he'd gone through most notable members of the Uzumaki clan all the way through Naruto himself when he noticed that Tandoki had been asleep on his lap for an unknown length of time. He cradled her in his arms and looked around, finally seeing that Haku had shifted to the side and opened up space beside herself in her bedroll, and slip Tandoki into it gently before finally lying down in his own bed.

They'd be walking for a while tomorrow, but at the end of it lay the Land of Bears' base. Kame would need to think of something by then, but at the moment all he could think about was… well, nothing, because he fell asleep shortly.


	49. Arc 5 Vol 6: From the Shadows

**(A/N) Took a week-long hiatus over Thanksgiving Break due to increased work and family time, but I'll be going right back into the daily updates for the next few weeks. Sorry for doing it unannounced; hopefully no one assumed I dropped it. On the very, _very_ slim chance that I do choose to drop the story, I'll change it from in-progress to complete.**

When they came close enough to see the edge of the pit that held the Land of Bears' base, Kame had figured out a plan. Well, to call it a plan would be giving it- and him- too much credit; it was actually more of a rough set of guidelines that collectively gave them a shot at success. It was all a moot point if they found Tandoki a guardian, though, so Kame made sure to keep his eyes peeled for anyone who looked up to the job. Sadly, miles of walking had led nowhere on that front, and at this point Kame had to just accept the weight on his shoulders that was dealing with Tandoki.

He winced when his eyes flickered over to her and reminded him that she was just as much of a joy as she was a burden. However, that was beside the point at the moment, because he was about to undertake the unenviable task of pitching his plan to Haku and Miriki. "Okay, guys, I… uh…"

 _I can't do it_ , Kame thought despairingly. _I can't try to have us take Tandoki into the base and pretend she's a new prisoner. Too much could go wrong, and if it did…_

"What is it, Kame?" Haku took a step in closer to him, looking genuinely curious as to why he'd stopped talking.

"I… I don't know what to do," he finally admitted, unsure of whether it felt better or worse to hear the words actually spoken out loud. Fearing the disappointment or, god forbid, forgiveness Haku would be showing towards him, he looked up to meet her eyes and found… reassurance?"

"Don't worry about it," Miriki sighed. Before Kame could comment on the excessive nonchalance the other boy was exuding, he simply continued talking: "We can just do it my way and see how things go, right?"

Kame wasn't sure what the right course here was, but he was pretty sure _that_ wasn't it. "No-"

"I'm betting that they'll just let us in, like at the other bases, right?" Apparently Miriki had found his groove and was now on a roll with his half-baked planning. "Tandoki can come in and they'll assume something about her, which we'll roll with, and then we go down to the prison. We get some of the prisoners to work with us, let 'em out, and then we're home free, right? If Orochimaru hates them enough to put them in a prison, then they can't be all that bad-"

"They can," Haku interjected.

Kame found his voice again and used it to agree with her sentiment. "Yeah, they definitely can, but…" Miriki did have a point. Assuming they still hadn't been revealed as Shinobi Union agents, the Sound ninja would probably make an assumption as to why they had Tandoki with them. Going along with that assumption would most likely keep them from falling under suspicion, yet…

"It's too risky." Haku shook her head and crossed her arms. "I'm not going to take Tandoki into one of Orochimaru's bases."

Miriki sat back, dropping a little bit of his cool persona to let a bit of frustration show. "So what then? Do we wait here for the problem to solve itself? Or run out of time and…" he scratched the back of his head a little awkwardly, seeming to be searching for the right way to say what he wanted to. "Look, I've never met Orochimaru, but from the way you two act and the fear I've seen, I think it's a safe bet to say that him coming back to life is pretty much the worst possible thing that could happen."

"But we can't-" Kame's eyes widened and he sucked in a surprised breath when he heard a noise break through the monotony of the forest- a quiet noise, but also one that didn't belong in the quiet rustlings and animals noises he'd been tuning out. The rasp of metal sliding slowly against metal sent his nerves into overdrive and he immediately activated his cursemark's first stage to see what the hell was going on, only to sense eight different signatures behind him.

Even as he dove forward, barking warnings to Haku and Miriki, he noted two terrible details; firstly, that he'd picked up on the approaching enemies far too late, and secondly, that they all bore the same corrupted blot of chakra that stained Kame's own aura. The people attacking their camp were cursemarked Sound ninja.

Kame would most likely have been cursing up a storm if he weren't busy doing everything in his power to claw back control of the situation. When he came out of his dive, it was to scoop up Tandoki and leap away from the danger, trusting Haku and Miriki to take better care of themselves than the child could.

The next few seconds were then spent mapping out where the chakra signatures of the combatants behind him were and avoiding them at all costs. Kame drew a kunai in case he needed to make any last-minute deflections, and lo and behold only two seconds later he was knocking a spine out of the air before it could skewer him. Tandoki shrieked, and it distracted Kame enough for the second spine to nearly catch him, but he managed to move enough to turn a crippling hit into a close shave that drew blood on his leg.

Two signatures were moving through the air away from the rest and he glanced up to see their holders: two batlike creatures flapping around trees and launching spines from their wings towards him. That above all else confirmed that this was an attack by Hidden Sound forces, because Kame had seen the batlike cursemarked shinobi before several times- the first one being on his first-ever mission. The poor souls currently trying to kill him and Tandoki were ex-shinobi who'd been reduced to mindless servants of Orochimaru by their cursemarks.

Unfortunately for them but perhaps fortunately for Kame, he knew exactly how their condition worked and what it meant as far as combat capabilities went. Despite Orochimaru's best efforts, he'd been unable to separate the parts of the mind dedicated to strategy and the parts dedicated to loyalty. That led to a discrepancy in the soldiers under his command, as all of those at the lower levels were either skilled and disloyal or loyal but unskilled; the mindless monstrosities and flighty mercenaries serving as evidence to the extremes of that pattern. There were exceptions to the general rule, but outside of the Sannin's inner circle they were few and far between.

Judging by the animalistic lack of intelligence in the eyes of this particular duo of batlike monsters, Kame would guess that they'd fall into the former group. Far into the former group, he quickly realized as he scanned their cursemarks once more and saw the amount of power being released. They were part of the earlier batches of the mindless soldiers, experimental prototypes that hadn't taken into account the lack of thinking associated with the lack of questioning orders.

With that fundamental weakness in mind, Kame deflected another two spines and activated his cursemark's second stage, but immediately faltered and almost fell when Tandoki let loose another terrified cry and struggled against his grip. He had her tucked underneath one arm, so even her weak attempts at escape proved too disruptive for him to deal with and he ended up almost letting her fall, so he was forced to drop the kunai and use his other hand to secure her more safely.

No kunai meant no deflecting, though, so Kame had to use two chakra threads to grab hold of the next two incoming spines. Without the necessary strength in those hastily-made threads to stop the spines, he took the next best option available and deflected them to the sides, sending them downwards a little bit as well. When his two foes simultaneously decided to swoop towards him while he was unarmed, a full plan fell into place in his mind and he began reeling in the spines as quickly as possible.

Managing to miraculously retain focus through another scream and subsequent attempt at escape by Tandoki, he gauged the rapidly closing gap between him and the enemies, slightly slowing the rate at which he was drawing the threads connected to the spines back into himself. The monsters closed in to the sound of one final scream from Tandoki that was cut off oddly quickly, but two meters away from their targets, their own spines' threads wrapped all the way around the tree limb upon which Kame stood and sent the spines in a complete arc, punching straight up through their chests.

Kame didn't fall into his old habit of letting his guard down, but this time he could have done so without being punished for it. His immediate scans of the area told him of no immediate threats, yet he remained wary until the two whumps of corpses hitting the forest floor shook him into action. Haku and Miriki were both dealing with _six_ enemies, which seemed to be going evenly based on their chakra signatures.

Tandoki's sudden quiet finally registered in Kame's brain and he checked to make sure that she was alright, finding her unconscious from either stress or exhaustion. After a split second of being torn on what exactly to do with her, he decided the lesser of two evils would be to leave her just outside the battle for the minute or two that it would likely take for him to tip the scales in favor of his teammates. He did just that, laying her gently behind a large tree trunk before gathering up chakra near his head and approaching the fighting.

Miriki and Haku were both on the defensive, using genjutsu and speed respectively to avoid deaths at the hands of the three mole-like and three bull-like monsters attacking them. Kame tossed out a paperbomb behind the enemies and then finished his jutsu during a minor lull in the combat, breathing out a large plume of ashen smoke: "Fire Style: Burning Ash Jutsu!"

One handsign was all it took to set off the firebomb, which in turn lit up the grey cloud into an explosion of light and heat that enveloped four of the monsters too stupid or slow to escape it in time. Two of them made it out but one immediately fell victim to a flurry of blows from Haku that ended with it totally out of commission, while the other one fell victim to Miriki's illusions and began fighting thin air. It soon suffered the same fate as its comrade and flew upward hard enough to smash through a tree branch after a vicious uppercut from Haku.

Another short moment of non-fighting gave Kame false hope that the battle might be over, only to have it crushed away by Miriki's widening eyes, horrified by something behind him. There was no hostile chakra signature nor any noise back there, but Kame's mouth fell open a little bit in shock when Tandoki's chakra signature began to rise up into the air. He whipped around to see a humanoid form wrapped in black bandages lifting the unconscious little girl by the throat, a sight that stilled any instincts to attack or run away and left him with only stillness borne from terror.

A toneless voice trailed from the dark form: "On your knees, hands behind your heads, or the girl pays the price." Kame did as he was told, shaking a little bit but totally unsure of what he was meant to do in this situation. He fell to his knees but kept staring at the newcomer, looking for any little scrap of information that could help.

The man was incredibly tall, nearly seven feet, and had slender limbs that almost seemed malnourished. The black bandages were covering every inch of his form, including his entire head, and a black ragged cloth was wrapped around his waist and came down to around his knees. Kame wasn't sure how, but the man's chakra signature wasn't just a blank void like Haku, it was perfectly meshed into the ambient chakra of the forest, almost like he wasn't… even… there…

"Genjutsu Release!" Kame made the handsign and began to straighten up, only to feel his hair parted by a long tendril of shadowy chakra that shot forward from the man's outstretched hand.

"Don't. Move." The order came just as tonelessly, but the words were a little bit more emphasized. Faced with his errant judgement coming in just after failing to notice two seperate ambushes and before that failing to come up with a plan, Kame was so disillusioned with his ability to think things through that he simply dropped back to his knees and put his two hands behind his head. He noticed through his chakra senses that Haku and Miriki seemed to have done the same.

Miriki spoke from his kneeling position with a lot more confidence than the situation really warranted. "Look, weirdo, what do you want?" When no answer came, he kept going without missing a beat: "Okay, not a talker, I respect that, but honestly are you just planning to make us sit here forever, or what? Why're you here right now, are you with Orochimaru?"

That time, he did get a reaction in the form of a deep sighing noise from their enemy. "Orders are to keep you from leaving."

 _Why would he just tell us that?_ Kame narrowed his eyes, deciding to chip in his own line of questioning. "You're powerful, and you're not one of Orochimaru's normal underlings… does that mean you're a prisoner?" No reply came, so Kame started thinking in his mind rather than out loud: _He's either a secret weapon of Orochimaru's that he never once mentioned to any of us, or he's something else…_ Kame scanned the man once more, this time as intently as he could, and found a tiny little discrepancy where his chakra failed to line up with the surrounding area by an almost undetectable margin. However, that tiny margin gave him a very rough outline of the man's chakra network, and that outline did not have the telltale and incredibly obvious stain of a cursemark. _That means it's unlikely that he's a minion; so if he really is a prisoner, then they're probably offering him something in exchange for capturing us… freedom?_

 _But to keep someone this skilled at stealth, who can move around without any of their senses, contained, they'd have to have something really powerful keeping them in check_. Kame thought back to his rare trips to the prison base, all of which had occurred while he'd been afraid to ask Orochimaru too many questions, and vaguely recalled the Sannin explaining how he guaranteed the prisoners' cooperation: a poison that had a cure known only to Orochimaru, which he would give out in doses small enough to temporarily preserve recipients' lives. Any escape would lead to death within a month's time without access to said cure, and the method of making that cure was one of Orochimaru's greatest secrets.

"Wait, I think I can cure you… I have some of Orochimaru's records here, and a summoning creature that knows poisons…" the man didn't move, and Kame began to grow nervous, but did his best to keep his voice steady as he continued speaking. "I… uh… can I move?"

"Summon once. Look at research. Anything else, and girl dies."

Kame slumped a little bit in relief and nodded. "Thank you so much… uh…" he trailed off, unsure of what to call the man.

"Itta." The tall man, Itta, didn't visibly the indentation of the bandages where his mouth should be at all when he spoke. Kame wondered if it was perhaps a jutsu that actually created an illusion, and the real one was lurking nearby-

 _Right, nevermind, back to the task at hand_. Kame pulled out the storage scroll and began sifting through records of Orochimaru's, noting when Haku made a slight movement and Itta immediately cracked down on her, but mostly focusing in on his immediate goal of finding the correct scroll with Orochimaru's poisons listed within it. He found the correct one and then began to cast the summoning jutsu before stopping himself as he read further, realization dawning when he realized that there _was no cure_.

The only way to prevent the poison's advance was to use an incredibly complex chakra-control technique to reset afflicted tissues on a cellular; a procedure that would prove lethal if done the slightest bit wrong and that was far beyond Kame's pay-grade. In fact, the more he read, the more he began to despair, because even attempting this would require tools, experience, and a lot of trust that simply weren't present at the moment. It began to dawn on him why Orochimaru would take weekly trips down to the Land of Bears base to deliver the cure in person; it truly would take someone of his caliber to be able to successfully administer it.

"Uh…" Kame started, unsure of how to proceed. Finally, he settled on an apologetic yet businesslike tone and settled his nerves before going forward: "When did Orochimaru last cure you? How many days ago was it?"

"Seventeen," Itta responded.

"Ah." _That means he has maybe fifteen or sixteen more days left before he needs a cure again… Orochimaru would resurrect by then, but if Itta knows that then he's going to remain loyal_ , Kame thought. Fear began to grow inside him as he realized that he'd have to lie, but lying wasn't something he was particularly skilled at, and he wasn't ready to risk all their lives on his ability to delude the clearly experienced Itta.

Fortunately, that fear ended up being exactly what a person who _was_ up to the task needed to see. Miriki, still crouched and holding hands behind his head, spoke with all the confidence Kame lacked. "Alright, Itta, here's the deal. I know Orochimaru's poisons, and I _really_ hate to be the one saying this to you, but he's dead and he's the only one who can make the cure."

Itta shivered a little bit and seemed to flicker in and out of existence, further supporting Kame's illusion hypothesis, but Miriki just kept talking: "So I guess your best chance is helping us kill the people in that base, right? You might as well take you revenge on the people who're lying to you _right now_ about how they have more cure!"

Itta dropped Tandoki, who crumpled to the ground in a heap but seemed to be otherwise alive and unharmed, yet it didn't look like he did it intentionally. The flickering sped up until he was flitting in and out of view rapidly, yet he still didn't speak and the three genin before him all remained kneeling.

Miriki was at least confident enough to keep his friendly tone going: "Anyway, you've got a couple weeks left, you can probably spend them trying to find a medical ninja skilled enough to help you, or taking revenge on Orochimaru, or living it up- but do you really want to spend them doing his will as one of his servant- oh, shit!"

That last expletive was shouted as Itta wailed and swung an arm down towards Tandoki, far faster than Kame could hope to stop. Haku teleported forward with that distinctive purple trail left by her cursemark's second stage and raised an arm to knock the blow aside, only to have a long shadowy tendril flicker through her and Tandoki, plunging into the ground. Her split-second thinking saved them both as she grabbed the child and rolled away to the side moments before the shadowy finger solidified back into reality again, taking out a large chunk of the ground with it.

 _Oh, shit_ , was all Kame could think as Itta's body seemed to stretch and lengthen, fingers extending forward and changing from inconsistent to solid randomly, taking out long slivers of the ground and trees with them. He had to roll to the side to dodge a particularly quick jab, only to find the black tendril twisting to follow him and forcing him to continue running. He readied a chakra in his palm to blast him and the tendril away from each other, but at the last minute saw a tiny bit of shadow poke out from his leg and noticed that _another_ tendril had come at him from behind. He had to release the chakra with a shout of "Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu!" just to launch himself skyward and avoid getting skewered.

Unfortunately, it was at that moment that his cursemark's second stage chose to run out and leave him with a discombobulated chakra network and zero preparation to deal with two tendrils coming up towards him. "Wind Style: Wind Cushion Jutsu!" was enough to move to the side and keep from getting skewered through any vital spots, but with a horrific amount of pain he felt a third tendril punch through his calf and yank him down towards the ground. He landed with full force and avoided breaking any bones, but the pain from his leg that now had a hole in it was overwhelming and he could barely drag himself up into a position leaning back against a tree.

No long fingers of darkness were coming towards him at the moment, which Kame took to be a good sign, until he noticed one that had come through the tree and was currently sticking out from his chest. He had enough time to think: _Shit, I'm dead_ , before blanking out.

However, he did come to, the darkness receding from his vision and revealing a fading purple trail at the edge of his vision. The center, though, was occupied entirely by Haku, whose clawed hand was extended towards his chest and draining away… everything. He saw the spirals filling her eyes and the purple shroud beginning to form, but above all was that sense of destruction and hunger that he now felt ripping away at his very life force.

When she… it… whatever she'd become lowered her hand, Kame felt dead inside, his chakra almost completely gone. However, he felt very much alive outside, so the tiny section of his mind not devoted to general horror reasoned that she must have consumed away the tendril along with his chakra. Her hand shook a little bit and then rose towards him once more, tugging on what was left of his chakra and life force, and all he could do was whisper, "No…"

The hand dropped, and his hope came back just a little bit, vanishing once more, though, when the dark specter of Itta blinked back into visibility just behind Haku and reached out with all five fingers. However, when they neared her, they seemed to break down and drain away into her seal, causing it to flare up with purple chakra and then send little lines of the stuff billowing over her body and etching out a pattern of cracks all over her. Itta tilted his head and spoke with emotion for once, uttering "What-"

He dodged with inhuman speed as Haku's hand shot out and made a grabbing motion where his chest had been, instead catching his arm and disintegrating it instead. He began backing away, then flickered out of view in full flight and left Haku standing there, covered in a spiderweb of purple chakra lines and slowly turning to look back at Kame with soulless eyes. One more time, the hand stretched out towards him, and he struggled to move but couldn't do it, watching certain doom begin that fateful drain that would kill him and begin a downwards spiral of feeding the void.

Instead of that, though, what he saw was a little blur of red and a scared little voice shouting, "Stop! Haku can't hurt Comma!" Tandoki interposed herself between the two of them, and although Kame was externally horrified that she'd put herself into danger, he was internally filled with irrational hope that this might be enough.

For the longest moment of Kame's life, the clawed arm remained outstretched towards him, and he managed to reach out with an arm to move Tandoki out of the way should the worst happen, but finally the arm fell down and Tandoki collapsed onto his lap without his touching her at all. Haku stood there, swaying slightly with the wind, but then began reaching out again, but this time it was towards Tandoki and there was nothing at all that Kame could do about it. He was just as helpless as he'd been under Orochimaru, unable to stop horrible things from happening to people he cared about right before his eyes.

She froze once more, but this time he was too far gone to let hope rush through him again. Instead, he gazed at her with dead eyes, waiting for the inevitable return of that raised claw that would rip his life away, but the wait dragged on and that stubborn little bit of hope forced itself back into his mind. This felt different than before, and the possessed Haku was completely still rather than wavering… _is she unconscious? If she is, then how…_ Kame wondered, instinctively wrapping an arm around the quivering Tandoki and hugging her close as much for his own sanity as hers.

A pained pant came from behind him, followed by Miriki's strained voice grinding out, "Hatogan Secret Art: Mind Execution- nnggh!" He choked off violently and the frozen Haku jerked a bit before starting to force herself forward step by step, blazing brighter and brighter with power and resisting whatever Miriki was trying to do to her…but Miriki wasn't giving in either. Kame turned to see his teammate's expression flaring with effort, the five points of his hatogan all extended past the edges of his eyes. The battle of wills- or, Miriki's will against the inexorable hunger of the tentails- came to a head as Haku's claw came closing in down over Tandoki and Kame, fingers stretching over them and threatening to crush their lives…

One more, Miriki's voice cracked out in shout of defiance. "Hatogan Secret Art: Mind Execution!" His eyes flashed with blue light and Haku stiffened, letting out a hiss of rage but collapsing as the purple chakra lines retreated back across her body and into her seal.

When it was finally done, she slumped forwards onto Tandoki, leaving Kame trapped underneath them both. He fought desperately against the unconsciousness nipping at the edges of his mind, but Miriki squatted down beside the pile of completely exhausted people and shook his head. "Alright, I'll move you guys somewhere safe and away from Mr. Creepy. Nighty-night, buddy."

Kame's vision finally slipped away from him, and he gave in to the impending sleep.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

It was early morning when Kame finally awoke to the sight of several people he didn't recognize, some with ragtag shinobi gear but all wearing threadbare prisoners' clothing underneath. Miriki was the first to acknowledge his return to the world of the waking, doing it with a smile and an all-too-familiar pat to his injured leg. "Hey, good morning, sleepyhead."

"Agh!" Kame gasped and blinked away whatever remnants of sleep were still present in his stupor, now thoroughly awake and very much annoyed. However, that annoyance shattered when he remembered the circumstances leading up to his sleep, and when he spoke again it was with concern: "Are Haku and Tan-"

"Relax, man," Miriki drawled, gesturing over to two bedrolls with purple and red hair respectively strewn around them. "They're okay, but I'm letting 'em sleep it off." Kame nodded, then looked around at all the newcomers to their camp, but this time Miriki cut him off before he could even start to voice his question. "Those're all the people that escaped the base- at least, the ones that I could get to come here. It was a real mixed bag; kind of a pain in the ass when everyone in the prison had a fifty-fifty chance of either being a serial killer or an innocent person. Still, I found someone to patch up your leg, and here we are."

Kame nodded, but then frowned. "Wait, who-"

"The base got taken out by yours truly," Miriki crowed, grinning widely. When Kame's disbelieving expression didn't budge, the Kosuki shrugged and rolled his eyes, continuing a little bit less pridefully, "Okay, fine, _maybe_ Itta went after the inside of the base first and then I sent a crow after him, and _maybe_ that crow used the confusion to stage a prison break, but basically it was all me."

The urge to complain and argue about that judgement was overridden when Kame's eyes trailed over to the unconscious Haku and Tandoki. He wasn't sure how he'd react when they woke up, but…

At least they were safe, and for the moment that was all that mattered.


	50. Arc 5 Vol 7: Thoughts Revealed

Tandoki woke a few hours after Kame did, at which point most of the freed legal shinobi had left. Kame was secretly glad that Miriki had been the one to break to them the news of Orochimaru's poisonous grasp over them, and apparently the Kosuki had done an admirable job of delivering that bad news; twenty or so shinobi from undeterminable villages were in various positions sitting or standing around their sheltered camp in a cave.

 _This is still bad_ , Kame reminded himself, forcing down the rising hopefulness and taking a deep look into the whole situation. _Miriki said that fifteen of them left, but I have the instructions for a cure. We can't hunt them all down in fourteen days- we only have thirteen days left to destroy the bases in the lands of Lightning, Water, Whirlpool, Fire, and Sound. Can we really even spend any more time here? If we just leave the scroll with the instructions of fixing it and…_

"Comma?"

 _Damn_ , he thought. Tandoki was standing there beside him, tugging on a sleeve and turning her pleading eyes on him. When she saw that she had his attention, she continued in a trembling tone that reminded him too much of the one she'd carried when they'd first rescued her. "Is Haku gonna be okay?"

"She's gonna be fine," Kame said with forced confidence. "She's just sleeping right now."

"Mmkay." Tandoki nodded, then turned to look at Miriki when his hands came down on her shoulders.

He smiled at her and said, "Can you let me and Comma have a little talk? Alone?" When she scampered off over to Haku, he continued in a more serious tone: "Okay, I spoke with the freed prisoners, and most of them agreed to a plan to take the cure to the Hidden Star. They'll wait there until they can get someone skilled enough to deliver the cure, and the village can protect them."

Kame opened his mouth to reprimand Miriki for the stupid plan, but found himself unable to find any flaws in it. _Huh_ , he considered, _for once I guess he actually got serious_. "Okay, so what about Tandoki? Are we sending her along?"

"Yeah, that was the plan," Miriki shrugged. "She almost died three times yesterday, we can't keep her with us."

"I agree." It was surprising how much he didn't want to see her go, but the same affection causing that desire to keep her with him also fueled a desire to keep her safe; as strong as he might have been, those two clashed with each other and ultimately his rational thoughts of the strategic weaknesses he brought were what broke the tie. "Are you… are you sure we can trust them all?"

Miriki crossed his arms, getting a little more mischievous in tone. "All of them? Nah, but we can absolutely trust most of them. There isn't anyone from the Whirlpool, so no progress on finding Tandoki's home, but besides that there's a pretty even mix out there. I-" he suddenly stopped talking, glancing off to the side, and then grinned with altogether too many teeth and took off.

Kame struggled onto his feet, feeling awfully sore in his muscles but surprisingly unhurt in his calf. Looking down, he saw that someone had bandaged (and presumably healed) the wound from the day before. Unfortunately, none of that helped his taxed body and chakra network, and fixing those would take gradual use for hours, starting now.

When he stepped out of the cave, he saw what his flippant teammate had been so distracted by: a teenage girl in a Hidden Mist headband with long green hair and eyes, looking appraisingly at Miriki as he approached. Another few awkward steps brought Kame close enough to hear what his friend was saying with absolute confidence: "So, besides my skills at prison breaking, what brings you here?"

"You're gonna have t' go first," she replied, coming across more playful than defensive with a thick drawl that was mildly familiar to Kame.

"Oh, I'm on an assignment from the Shinobi Union to eliminate Orochimaru's entire empire," he said deftly, stating it like a fact in order to sound humble while still touting himself. "I'm the leader, and then there's Haku and Kame, my henchmen. We- or, should I say, _I_ already took down five bases pretty much on my own; six if you count my crow army getting rid of the scum keeping you prisoner."

"Wasn't there only… one crow?"

Miriki shook his head gravely. "That's what they thought, too. The invisible crow army gets 'em every time." She giggled, and he kept it up: "You can't fight what you can't see. Actually, little-known fact here; if the crows had been summonable during the Fourth Ninja War, Madara Uchiha would have almost immediately been pecked to death by invisible crows and everybody would have called it a day."

The girl's eyes widened in surprise, either mock or real. "Wow… and where're ya going now?"

"Off to Orochimaru's next base, and then the next," Miriki declared. "I'm gonna destroy his entire empire single-handedly."

Kame interjected himself there. "'Single-handedly? Really?"

"Oh, you're walking around already." Miriki sounded less than ecstatic. "Great, then Kame, please meet Awadatsu. Awadatsu, say hi to Kame."

"Hi!" She waved at him, voice chipper and smiling like an old friend, then offering a hand to him. "I'm Awadatsu- oh, oops; Miriki already told ya that, huh? Anyway, it's great t' meet ya. Miriki told me all about you!"

Kame tried to muster that same blind joy in his reply, but failed to find it. "Oh. I'm Kame… nice to meet you too, I guess."

"See? He's lost when it comes to talking to other people, like I said." Miriki was smug enough to once again annoy Kame into speaking up more.

"Hey!" He turned to Awadatsu, finding a little bit of more mundane dread replace the existential stuff that had been plaguing him recently. "What else did he say about me?"

"Well…" Awadatsu looked upwards as if trying to remember something, then straight-facedly began recounting: "He said you're his sidekick who follows him around on his ninja adventures, he said he rescued ya from Orochimaru just like he rescued me… let's see, what else? Oh right, he also said ya-"

"Hey, let's not tell him about that part, okay?" Miriki interjected, placing a hand on her shoulder and turning her to look at him. "How about we skip to the part where I explain the situation to Kame, alright?"

"So _now_ you want to- you know what? Forget it," Kame said. "But Awadatsu, I'm not his sidekick and he didn't save me from Orochimaru… Awadatsu?" She didn't seem to be paying attention to him, staring at Miriki unabashedly with a slight smile on her face, so he trailed off awkwardly and then coughed his way into a new subject. "Okay, nevermind on that. Miriki, we only have thirteen days to bring down five bases. We head out right… now…"

 _No_ , he reminded himself, _we can't. Haku_. A glance towards her lying there unconscious sent a surprising amount of awful memories through his head. _How many times has it been? It never, ever gets any better, does it? Is this really a shinobi's life, watching their friends in pain?_

The sounds of Awadatsu's happy clap sent his mind back to the present, where she was smiling even more than she had been before. "I'm gonna come with ya guys!"

"What? No!" Kame said, just as Miriki took a very different track.

"Sure!" The Kosuki grinned and high-fived her, apparently acting like Kame hadn't even opened his mouth. "Awadatsu, welcome to the Miriki force- now twice as attractive on average!"

Kame winced at that one, but she seemed to eat it right up. He thought Haku was significantly prettier; in fact, there was something that he just couldn't put his finger on about Awadatsu that repulsed him a little bit. The more he looked at her, the more it irked him…

"We're leaving now," said one of the older ninja still lingering in and around their camp, now gathered at the cave entrance. "Miriki, thank you for all you and you team have done for us."

"We're not-" Kame tamed his annoyance once again, realizing what this meant. He turned towards Tandoki, who was kneeling next to Haku and playing with something in her hands. When he approached her, his heart sank- it was the little blue flower he'd folded for her days ago, now looking significantly worse for the wear and putting a lump in his throat. "I… Tandoki…"

"Yeah, Comma?" She fell on her back to lie there and look at him upside down.

"We need to…" He bit his lip. "Tandoki, I think it's time that…" Those damn eyes, wide open with confusion and innocence, made the lump in his throat grow until it refused the passage of any more words.

"Huh?"

"I… we have to say goodbye now, okay?"

Tandoki misunderstood, simply nodding and saying, "Bye!" but making no move to leave or show signs of sorrow. Kame half-glanced around for assistance but got himself back on track with a solid reminder that this was his job and no one else's.

"I'm really happy that I got to spend some time with you, but you need to find your mom and dad, and I… we… can't take you there." She widened her eyes and mouth a little more, the first little hints of sadness creeping into her confused expression. "It's time to say goodbye, Tandoki-" she made a small sobbing noise, but he kept going. "Hey, hey, it's okay, you can go with your parents, right? Don't you want to see your mom and dad?"

"No!" She spun to face his leg and grabbed his pant with balled fists, sounding a lot more afraid than anything else. "No, no, no… I don't wanna…"

"Why not?" Kame hoped, somewhat unrealistically, that maybe he could reason with her by bringing up the two people she definitely loved more than the three ninja who'd picked her up.

"'Cause… 'cause… I don't wanna go back…"

Kame began to sense something awry, but he couldn't put his finger on it. "Back where?"

"They stopped… they told me to run, 'cause the monsters came, an' then they didn't run…" She wiped a tear out of her eye. "An' then I hided, an' then the monsters still came."

"I… uh…" Kame sat down heavily. "What… are your parents dea-"

"Tandoki, don't think about that," Miriki interjected from the cave mouth, striding in quickly and gently turning Tandoki to face him. "I promise we won't leave you, but we have to go stop the monsters now… we have to protect you, okay?"

"But mommy an' daddy tried to-"

"Tandoki," Miriki said, his eyes meeting hers and his expression caring. "I promise that we're gonna come back, and I promise that if you stay strong and quiet, you can spend as much time with us as you want, but you have to be brave."

"I…" She seemed to be out of danger for throwing a tantrum, but her rapid blinking suggested quieter and calmer tears incoming.

"Wakara is gonna watch you for a little while, okay?" A kind-looking woman in a civilian's dress but a Hidden Star headband approached with open arms, and Tandoki didn't resist getting pulled up and walking off hand in hand with her new guardian.

Surprisingly, Tandoki turned with tear-streaked eyes and smiled back at them, offering one last "I love you, Meeky, Comma, Haku!"

"I… love you too," Kame responded with more sincerity than he thought.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

It was nightfall by the time Haku woke up, and Kame had been practicing with Emperor a safe distance away from her and Miriki, but the instant he heard her quick inhalation and shift to a sitting upright position in her bedroll, he was dismissing the puppet and bolting over to her. He landed on his knees beside her and opened his mouth to speak, but the hundred questions and reassurances and declarations jumbling around in his head all tried to come out at once and ended up jamming and letting out only a quiet squeak.

She didn't notice the noise or even Kame himself, and her eyes simply gazed forward with extreme distress towards the treeline. Confused, he followed her gaze and found nothing but the same trees, only to be all but tackled from the side by Haku, who was now quietly crying with two arms wrapped around him. His mind went out of panic mode almost immediately at her familiar smell and pressure, leaving him to hug her back from his lying position on the ground and wonder, _is it wrong that some part of me enjoys this…?_

In time, the tears subsided and the sobs grew weaker and weaker until she pulled back and wiped her face with a coat sleeve. Their eyes met and his approaching torrent of questions froze up once again, which meant that the silence went on for several long seconds. _I need to learn how to-_

"God, finally, that was _forever_ without even making it to first base," Miriki complained loudly. "If you two are just about finished with your sort-of-but-not-quite flirting, can we actually talk about what happened?"

Once again, he displayed that uncanny knack to annoy the living daylights out of Kame and then follow it up with a transition that rendered all that rage impotent. At the mention of the prior events, he lost the heart to rip into his Kosuki teammate and instead glanced back at Haku, who looked completely lost as to what to say.

"Haku, you can't blame yourself for what happened, okay? You did what you had to to save my life." Kame did his best to channel as much forgiveness and reassurance into those two sentences as possible.

"I'm so, so sorry, I almost…" Haku bit her lip and then changed angles. "I don't think I'm ever going to be able to control it…" she said, which put off Kame a bit- _Why is that what she's worried about?_

"Of course you can't; it's pure evil, nobody could. I'm amazed that you can even keep it inside you all the time," Kame said, choosing his words carefully to cast no blame or guilt on her.

"But I… you almost died, and it saved you- I could save you, when I used it." Kame saw now the dangerous path her mind was taking, but didn't have the faintest clue how to stop it. "I have to learn how to keep it under control-"

"No!" Kame snapped, before continuing on with a softer tone. "No, you can't… it's evil, and if you mess up one time then it could cost everything."

"But the Tanikage, and Orochimaru, and even the other Kage," she protested faintly, almost seeming to argue against herself rather than Kame. "They want us dead, and we can't stop them without-"

"That _monster_ wants us dead, too!" Kame regretted the harsh words, but the thought of that evil presence and what it had almost done to him kept the words coming. "We have to think of other ways, ways that don't involve trying to control something you obviously can't!"

"What other way?" Haku's retort was angry, angrier than she's ever been towards him. "How? Are _you_ going to fight them all off by yourself? You can't protect me from everything, Kame!"

The words were factually true, but that didn't make them any less immediately impactful to Kame's mental state. "If you let that monster out," he seethed, "Then you're exactly the monster that the Kage wanted to execute."

Kame caught the briefest look at her face, which wore absolute betrayal that pierced his angry bubble, but then she disappeared in a blur of purple towards the trees. Miriki, for once, had no smart comment or anything at all to say, which left Kame with nothing to think about but the rapidly blooming regret in his heart. "Haku, I…"

But she was gone.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

That night was the longest one Kame could remember, most likely because he spent the entire time awake and hoping that Haku would come back. At first, he wanted to apologize, but more thinking time let him convince himself that he actually just needed to explain how she'd misunderstood and what he'd said wasn't actually that bad. In the middle of the night, further overthinking led to the conclusion that it was actually all Miriki's fault, but when the first cracks of dawn began to peek out over the trees and the pile of paper shuriken in his lap began to spill out onto the ground, he finally came full circle and yearned more than anything to the chance to saw he was sorry.

It was much later in the morning that she returned, looking about as awful as he assumed he did and refusing to meet his eyes. Miriki and Awadatsu remained fast asleep, so this time when she sat down facing him, there was nothing to break the ensuing silence.

 _Just do it_ , he thought. _Say you're sorry!_ However, his voice would not obey him, trapped behind some combination of stubbornness, regret, and simple, irrational fear that saying it out loud would bring all that terrible conflict back. Instead, he studied her face and found hints of the same emotions in her expression, as well as a whole lot of the betrayal. _We're not in the same boat_ , he reminded himself, _because I'm not as alone as her. I have a family back in the Sand, I had friends… she had Gaara, then no one, and then me_.

He tried and failed to imagine what it would be like if the only person he had a bond with had called him a monster just like everyone else. _God, I'm a shit person, aren't I?_

"Haku, I'm sorry. I'm…" The words that had remained unspoken for so long were difficult to force out, but ultimately out they came. "I'm afraid of so much, so many people who want to hurt me and you, and I'm afraid of the tentails inside you… When you let it out, I…" His voice broke. "I don't want to be afraid of you, too"

Haku blinked a few times, and then looked at the ground. "I'm sorry that you had to give up so much for me, I'm sorry that you have to be afraid… I'm not worth-"

"No." Kame's instincts brought his hand to her chin, tipping her face up so he could meet her eyes. "You're worth more."

Surprise met with gratitude met with… something else… in her eyes, and that same instinct, giving him enough bravery to work around the crippling indecision that typically swamped him. His lips parted slightly and he leaned forwards, his heartbeat filling his ears until it was almost deafening, and-

"Pay up." The whisper came from off to his left, in the voice of an apparently _not_ asleep Miriki. Kame and Haku both whipped their heads to the side and tensed up, only to see Miriki still fast asleep. _What the hell? Wait, was I about to-_

"Heh, guess you're the one payin' me, right?" Awadatsu's voice came alongside Miriki's, yet she was also still apparently asleep in her bedroll. _Is this…_

"Genjutsu Release," Kame hissed, his immediate embarrassment translating into annoyance. Just as he'd suspected, the sleeping Miriki and Awadatsu disappeared from his vision, and the real ones were revealed standing in the treeline with quickly stifled smiles. _God damn it_ , Kame cursed in his head, _I'm not sure whether I'm more relieved or angry- no, no, I'm definitely angry_.

"How long?"

Miriki's grin didn't waver at all. "How long was I doing what?"

"How. Long. Were. You. Watching. Us?" Kame enunciated each syllable with as much threat as he could muster up, but he was sure that the intended graveness was most likely undercut by the growing blush he could feel heating his cheeks.

"Don't worry about that, just do what you were gonna do," Miriki responded, a little more tensely now.

"What…" Kame's eyes flickered back over to Haku but returned almost immediately to Miriki. "What are you doing?"

"I'm-" Miriki paused, and then sighed. "Guess it's not happening. Damn it. Awadatsu, you win."

"Told ya he was too shy," Awadatsu chided, before turning over to her belongings and starting to pack them up. "Anyway, didn't y'all say we only had thirteen days?"

"Uh, twelve now, actually." Kame's eyes widened when he realized that. "Shit. Shit! We have twelve days to hunt down five bases!" He began urgently stuffing everything into his backpack, cursing mentally. "Guys, we have to go!"

"Chill," Miriki said, but he grudgingly began packing as well. It only took perhaps ten minutes to get everything ready and then they were off towards the bordering land of Lightning. Is was only hours later, as they walked down the road, that something occurred to Kame. "Miriki, can you engage your Hatogan?"

Miriki winced. "I don't think that's a great idea right now."

That confirmed it. In the morning, Kame had thought that his teammate's eyes had only contained four spokes, so the hesitance when he'd never before been cautious about using them was out of character. "How did it happen?"

"I don't think we should do this right now, Kame." Miriki's tone was one of warning, cautioning him not to question further, but Kame figured the Kosuki's ego could take a little bruising.

"How did you _lose_ a point?" Kame pushed the subject, stating his theory so Miriki would have to answer.

Miriki's expression went to glaring for an instant, and then to his usual impassiveness. "Well, I pushed it pretty hard to stop the tentails, and it got close enough to me to do a little damage. My best guess is it destroyed the chakra points of my eyes that were trapping it first, but didn't finish the job, so now I'm… well, whatever. It doesn't matter."

Kame realized that Miriki had dodged the subject because it would hurt Haku, not out of egotism, and internally cursed himself for being so blind. Haku bit her lip and looked saddened, but remained silent, giving Kame nothing to deny or reassure her about. He could only walk in silence with her, rejoining the conversation when the subject changed, but somehow feeling like something was different now.

For some reason, his thoughts kept drifting to that moment when he'd subconsciously been moving to kiss her, unable now to decide whether he wished he had or not. No matter how hard he racked his brain, overanalyzing their conversation to the extreme, the little details that he usually held tight to were for once slipping his mind. _Was she moving to kiss me back? Was she scared, or…?_

With a mild amount of surprise, he realized that somewhere along the line he'd taken his desire to kiss her for granted. It was now a given that he'd want to do such a thing, but he couldn't quite put his finger on when or how such a huge paradigm shift had occurred. _Shouldn't I remember something that important?_ He asked himself, taking a moment to look over at her unsuspecting face and actually considering what he felt at the sight of it. _Just when did I fall in love with her?_


	51. Arc 5 Vol 8: Heartbreaker

**(A/N) Holy shit, a lot has happened since I last uploaded. Our house got broken into and my computer was stolen, so I had to use my phone to type out replies to reviews and personal messages for a while. Good news is, my computer is back, which makes larger-scale writing viable again. Here's another chapter, hopefully the first of many for the coming weeks.**

* * *

Kame kept the paper butterfly's wings flapping steadily in front of him, angling it slightly forward so it could keep pace with his walking speed while staying at roughly the same height. So far he was setting a new record, as it had been in the air for nearly fifteen minutes now, almost twice his previous highest time for keeping it off the ground. _Actually_ , he thought, _it's a little weird, every time I tried this before, I got interrupted by-_

"Heya Kame!" Miriki slapped him on the back, causing him to lose concentration and drop the butterfly into the dirt of the road.

 _Yup, there it is_. His annoyance mitigated by the fact that he had pretty much been expecting something like that, Kame responded with measured patience in his tone. "What?"

"Just wondering if you knew a guy called Hiretsuna?"

 _On the other hand_ , Kame considered, _that's very unexpected_. "Yeah, I knew him. Why?"

Awadatsu took her place next to Miriki and joined the conversation with an inquisitive voice. "Y'all knew him? Cool! Where'd he go?"

"Once again," Kame asked, "Why?"

"'Cause he's my dad!" Awadatsu said, without the slightest hint of shame. It almost seemed like she had absolutely no clue about what the man had done, putting Kame in a bit of a bind as to what he could say to her. Seeing his (probably pained) expression, she winced and kept going a little less happily: "Oh, it's not- I know he's a bastard, just want to know if we're gonna run into him."

Kame let out a flat "No." before losing his focus when it actually registered in his mind that Hiretsuna- _Hiretsuna!_ \- had procreated. _Who would… with him? Why…?_

"How? Is he dead?" Awadatsu, ever enthusiastic, held no visible sorrow even when asking about the death of her own father.

"He's…" Kame worked his mouth for a few seconds before definitively answering. "Yeah, he's dead. I'm sorry for your-"

"Don't be." Awadatsu waved a hand in a vaguely dismissive gesture, and try as he might Kame was still unable to find even the tiniest bit of remorse or sorrow in her features. "He was a total piece of work- did y'all do it?"

"Orochimaru did," Kame said, noting a small reaction from Haku. _That's right_ , he remembered, _I never really told her how he died?_ Focusing more on Haku than on Awadatsu now, he kept talking with quite a bit less restraint: "Orochimaru extracted the Sixtails from him, which removed the acid resistance but left the acid blood inside him, and… well, it's pretty self-explanatory from there."

"So he melted from his own acid?" Awadatsu snorted. "Guess that's only fair. Can't say I'm sad to see him go."

"But…" Kame struggled with trying to find a polite way to say what he wanted to. "Isn't there something… how did he even end up… _Hiretsuna_ was your dad?"

"Calling him my dad isn't fair to any real dads. He never gave a crap about my mom or me 'til Orochimaru wanted the Nimideru bloodline. 'Course, _then_ he hunts down that bastard child he heard rumors about and drags me off to be Orochimaru's prisoner for years n' years where I never get to see him even once…" As she'd been talking, Awadatsu's face had grown gradually darker and angrier, shedding the calm and happy demeanor she'd been wearing since the morning, but she seemed to realize the change and immediately leaped back to the shallow smile. "He's gone now, though."

"Nimideru clan?" Miriki tossed in a query with curiosity that was a little out of character for him, but Kame knew better at this point than to question his teammate's instincts when it came to emotional interaction.

Awadatsu responded in stride, nodding and gesturing towards her greenish hair. "Yup, Nimideru. Don't know much about us, 'cept we used to be stronger and we can do Acid Release."

Kame was about to ask what it was, but decided to wait a little while in order to avoid seeming overexcited and embarrassing himself. Unfortunately, Miriki decided to do the embarrassing for him by nodding at him and saying, "Awadatsu, you'd better explain what that is, I think Kame might explode if you don't."

She grinned at the jab and despite himself, Kame did as well, although the smile faded from his face as she started speaking. "It's pretty obvious, ain't it? I can make Acid and do stuff with it." A frown crossed her face as she concentrated on something, and then waved an arm off to the side, splattering a tree with some whitish substance that quickly melted into the bark. Kame swallowed, a little bit _too_ reminded in that moment of Hiretsuna's nastier tendencies. "Plus I guess Orochimaru thought we were good with the Saiken or something? I don't know, but that's the real reason he picked up Hiretsuna."

 _Hiretsuna did say that he got the sixtails to listen to him_ , Kame considered. _Was that because of some sort of kekkeigenkai?_

Miriki's joke cut through the mild tension. "I guess it's the reason he got rid of him too, right?"

For a moment, Kame thought that to say something like that was too callous, but a glimpse of the smirking visage reminded him not to take his friend so seriously. "Yeah, I guess it was."

The conversation dipped back down again as they passed by a traveler on the road, most likely a merchant judging from the overstuffed cart and casual dismissal of them. The silence allowed Kame to think through the upcoming trial. The Land of Lightning held Orochimaru's information stockpile, his library of all the research he'd conducted besides the sensitive information on his rebirth.

It was one of the better-defended bases, and its master was one that Kame knew fairly well: a kunoichi named Kirai, one of Orochimaru's most loyal followers and just below the Sound Ninja Four and Grandmother in rank. He briefly entertained the thought of trying to reason with her but dashed it just as fast, because she was of Orochimaru's old guard and loyal to the death. Her brand of jutsu, too, was one that Kame had some brief difficulty trying to think of a way to defeat. They had hours until they reached their destination, though, so that gave him (hopefully) enough time to come up with a solution.

 _Alright, time to get to work_ , he ordered himself. Step one was the same as it always was, laying out everything he could consider about the situation in his head. The Land of Lightning base was, in keeping with the village it was designed to keep an eye on, suspended in the mountains among the clouds. However, unlike its legal village counterpart, it was not immediately visible until one approached almost directly to the main gates.

The last time Kame had been inside those gates, the library base had held forty or fifty people, most of whom were lackeys or test subjects. With the order from Grandmother to recall, that number had gone up, but to what degree Kame had no way to know. In fact, the only reason they'd been able to do as well as they had so far was the element of surprise, which may well be gone by now; the prison base had sent out people to attack them. _They might not have known that it was us_ , Kame conceded, but soon shook away the urge to take that easy way out. _No, we have to assume the worst or else we'll be the ones getting surprised and killed_.

On top of that, so far the only bases they themselves had attacked were the ones in the Land of Wind and the Land of Earth. Both of those places had skeleton crews of cursemarked slaves used for defense and minor missions, but the far greater majority of their populations had been made up of scientists and lackeys. The other two had been barracks and training grounds, but the Waterfall and Rain ninja had done the hard work there, meaning that despite being nearly halfway through their targets, Kame and company had yet to encounter real resistance.

 _No_ , he recalled, _Itta was definitely really resistant_. That creature had nearly killed him and forced Haku past the point of no return. One fight had left Miriki permanently weakened; they definitely couldn't get caught in another one. _Where did that… thing… even end up?_

 _Right, nevermind, back to the planning_. Assuming that they'd be hostile on first contact, the Land of Lightning base's occupants would be likely to refuse to lower the platform and let them in. That meant they'd be in for a long climb, almost directly upwards, while taking heavy enemy fire…

 _Damn_. That idea went out the window as Kame realized that Haku wasn't able to climb straight up the sheer cliff surface due to her sealed-off chakra network. _Maybe I could…?_

"Awadatsu," he said conversationally, "can you control the acid release enough to melt handholds for Haku to climb with?"

"Sure," the jovial girl replied, before turning back to the quiet conversation she was having with Miriki. Kame took the information down, moving forward to the next hurdle- the rank and file defenders. There'd likely be more flying-, digging-, and fighting-type cursemarked soldiers, as well as several lower-level shinobi. Kirai was almost definitely the only powerhouse, but they couldn't afford to count out the soldiers in the place.

On the other hand, the scientists they likely could count out. They were almost all noncombatants, more interested in overseeing various experiments of Orochimaru's than defending them. Unfortunately (for them), cursemarked they were, so they'd have to die, and Kame would be the one to track them down by using his Stage One eyes. He discovered that very fragile chakra lines existed, stretching between the piece of paper counting every possible resurrection target to those targets themselves- though it didn't work if they were too far away.

That interaction would allow them to hunt any who tried to run, but the greater issue was dealing with those who stood and fought. Awadatsu was a genin at most, as was Miriki in a fight, while Kame and Haku were still probably each far below jonin-rank in terms of power. To take on such an extreme number of foes, especially if they coordinated to attack at once, wasn't a risk the aggressors should take.

The base was built into the mountain itself, so trying to bring it down from the outside was a fool's errand. Sneaking bombs into it would require more stealth than any of them were capable of, and as Kame had already thought through, a full-out assault was a terrible idea. _What's left_ , he wondered, _what's the angle?_

First off, he'd have to designate people to deal with Kirai. The Sound's 'Heartbreaker' had a very distinctive jutsu, one that had earned her a slightly less glamorous nickname- The Succubus. When Kame had first seen it, he'd actually been a bit reminded of Miriki, insofar at least in how when she defeated her opponents, it wasn't by fighting. _Haku cannot be allowed to fight her_ , he decided- Kirai's enslavement genjutsu would be inescapable for someone who couldn't use genjutsu release.

A quick verbal check revealed Awadatsu didn't know genjutsu release, either, so she and Haku couldn't be in the fight. That left Kame and Miriki as the only two able to deal with Kirai, and given Miriki's… personal weaknesses, Kame didn't have a whole lot of faith that his less reliable teammate would be of much help.

Still, a warm body in the fight who could release genjutsu was enough. Miriki and Kame would have to be the ones to end Kirai, while Haku and Awadatsu dealt with the incoming hordes of lesser shinobi. They could probably do that, as long as they had a good defensive position, right?

Kirai herself would be a challenge. She knew a very specific brand of enslavement genjutsu that would turn whoever fell first, Kame or Miriki, into her thrall. The kicker was that the victim would continue to see and experience whatever they expected to be happening, even as their body itself did as she commanded. The only way to fight someone like her was to constantly release genjutsu in case they'd been caught, but that meant pausing in the middle of a fight to do a chakra-control exercise over and over. The genjutsu could only be used through skin-to-skin contact, but considering how instantly it took effect, the victim might not even notice they'd been touched and would continue merrily on in their head as their body fought to the death for Kirai.

"Alright, guys, here's what we're going to do…"

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

Kame readied his wind jutsu as Awadatsu darted forward, lobbing small projectiles of acid that each sizzled a few inches into the stone of the mountain before fizzling out impotently. The base had yet to attack them, but one couldn't be too careful- lowering their guard at any point could lead to a nasty surprise, followed by death. The Nimideru girl peppered the cliff face at rough intervals, yet still no attack came… why would?

"Genjutsu release!" Kame focused his chakra, but nothing changed. _Still_ , he reassured himself, _better safe than sorry_. Awadatsu was still making excellent progress on her mountainous target, cutting into it with attack after attack, until finally one of her globs of acid disappeared into the illusion covering the base's door.

Now came what was probably the most tactically sketchy part. Kame ran chakra down into his feet while holding more in his forearm and began to charge up the sheer cliff face, ready at any point to release the wind he'd prepared to knock away any incoming projectiles. There was still no resistance, but he didn't let up until he saw his leg disappear into the illusion, following it in until he found himself standing in the alcove before the door to their objective.

He heard Miriki's quiet steps and Haku's somehow even quieter climbing, but Awadatsu's loud breathing and haphazard climbing was enough to make him wince and wonder how they _still_ hadn't been caught-

"Genjutsu Release!" Nothing again. Little flashbacks to the methodically executed Land of Rain base and the ritually sacrificed Land of Waterfalls base both put him on edge, but thus far he had no reason to suspect a similar outcome here. His three allies each clambered up onto the ledge, so Kame finally reabsorbed his wind chakra and straightened up enough to step over to the door, reaching out to open it before catching himself.

 _Right, we're enemy ninja_. Shaking his head ruefully, he reached into a pack and removed several paperbombs, laying them onto the massive steel door in a rough rectangle. While the door was designed to withstand attacks from elemental jutsu, Kame knew the seals placed on it created a defensive anti-chakra field a few inches out from the door itself. However, that wouldn't help when the paperbombs were within the border of the field; in fact, it would only help, because when Kame made the detonation handsign, the resulting explosion was held _in_. The blast, confined to the area just before the door, was roughly tripled in effectiveness and rather than neatly blowing a rectangular entryway, Kame's bombs shattered the gate into a million metal pieces of shrapnel and sprayed it into the base.

The light of the blast momentarily revealed an interior chamber with quite a few enemies in it, but when the shrapnel and explosion had done their work, few were left alive and none were left in any shape to put up a fight. Kame stepped in, eyeing his surroundings warily, but his initial analysis had seemed to be correct- in a stroke of luck, every defender within the base's doors had been incapacitated in the blast. In fact, it almost seemed _too_ lucky, and Kame quickly brought his hands up to make the sign: "Genjutsu Release?"

Nothing. Kame made his way forward much more carefully now, tossing back some instructions for his teammates: "Okay, remember the plan, guys. We stick together until Kirai shows up, then me and Miriki fight her and Awadatsu and Haku peel off. Okay?"

Three confirmations sounded from behind him, so he stepped forward and began to methodically check each and every downed foe, slashing throats with the kunai whenever necessary. All of the downed enemies were lower-tier cursemarked foes, which made killing them quite a bit easier on Kame's conscience. He noticed out of the corner of his eyes Haku and Awadatsu stepping in with bare hands and acid respectively to aid him in his grisly work. Meanwhile, that little piece of paper he kept in his pocket just kept counting down: from 519 down to 518, 517, 516, and finally 507 by the time they'd finished.

Looking back, Kame reached into his pack and drew out some twine, as well as a paperbomb he'd reverse-engineered from the papers Orochimaru had extricated him and Haku from the Leaf with. The two bombs were flattened against each other and would both go off if separated, making it perfect for traps. _I don't think anyone will be able to sneak past us_ , Kame reasoned, _but I'm setting up a safeguard either way_.

Ten bombs and ten tripwires later, Kame was fairly sure that no one would be leaving the base without his knowing, especially not the scientists. The shinobi underlings would probably miss the traps, but the mercenaries were more competent and could probably spot them a mile away; that said, the mercenaries didn't have cursemarks and Kame didn't need to worry about their escapes.

When he led the other three around the corner, they entered the central hall of the library, standing on a ledge that ran all the way around the massive hall with stairs leading down to the library floor and exits on either side. To the right was a staircase leading down into the lower levels, where the researchers would be testing their theories, and to the left was a staircase leading up to the living quarters and barracks. However, right before them was the library itself, a massive stockpile of information contained within books and scrolls of all shapes and sizes, fitted on a labyrinth of shelves with only the dimmest of light.

It was strangely abandoned, but Kame knew that enemies could be hiding within the massive shelves. He knew he should probably lead with a round of explosives, but something inside him shied away from damaging all that precious knowledge. By the time he gathered his nerves, it was too late, because emerging from the ground level up onto the top of one of the shelves was Kirai herself.

"Haku, Awadatsu, go. The ninja are on the right." Kame knew he had to get them out before Kirai had a chance to catch them in a genjutsu, and that meant distracting the woman. When it came to distractions, though, he had an ace in the hole. "Summoning Jutsu!"

When Kumokafu emerged from the smoke, she was looking at Kame boredly, then tracked his outstretched arm to see where he was pointing, eyes finally settling on the enraged Kirai. Wordlessly, she shimmered like a mirage, colors shifting around until they finally settled on a new form: that of… Orochimaru.

 _Well, I guess I know why she's so loyal now_ , Kame noted to himself. Haku and Awadatsu made it to the door and fled up the stairs, which was exactly what he'd hoped for-

"Genjutsu Release?" This time, a little put off by the last three times he'd tried and it had been unnecessary, Kame was less than surprised when his senses remained as they were. That meant he could continue from where he was right then: looking towards a confused, rapidly growing to be enraged Kirai. At the moment, she was hesitant to attack Kafu's faux Orochimaru disguise.

"My… my lord Orochimaru?" she whispered, eyes wide. "I knew it! I knew you couldn't be gone…" She took a few steps forward towards Kafu, reaching for something in her pocket. "Oh, my lord Orochimaru, you'll _have to do better than that_!" The last few words were spoken rapidly as she drew and threw a kunai forward towards the summon.

Kafu tried and failed to dodge, taking a direct hit and disappearing in a puff of chakra smoke. Kame glanced over at Miriki, who was eyeing Kirai with a fair bit of interest, before looking back to her himself and catching sight of her beginning to transform into her Second State, growing long and leathery bat's wings and increasing in size, her clothes replacing themselves with a dark armor that barely covered her waist and chest. Kame knew that the armor was just for show, but show it did and Miriki seemed to enjoy it too much.

"Miriki! Snap out of it!"

The Kosuki shook his head a little bit and shot Kame a look. "What, I'm not allowed to enjoy the view?"

"I'll let you enjoy a whole lot more than just the view…" Even Kirai's voice was changed, from a harsh bark to a silky-smooth flowing tone, sounding almost as though she was whispering directly into Kame's ear. "Why don't you lay down your weapons and come with me, I promise I won't hurt you… at least, not in any ways you don't _beg_ for."

Miriki grinned at her. "Oh, I get it…" he tossed a kunai at her, but she evaded it seemingly with ease and waved a finger at him.

"Tut tut, don't be like that… I'm a lover, not a fighter-"

"Yes!" Miriki pumped a fist in the air, much to the complete surprise of both other people in the library. Kame actually turned all the way over to look at his friend, hoping his mind's confusion made it into his eyes, but Miriki ignored him and kept talking: "Yes! Finally, another woman of culture. I see you are also a master of the persuasive arts; this will be a battle for the ages!"

"What kind of little-" Kirai started, breaking character, but she regained control quickly and began to drift towards Miriki with casual flaps. "What sort of battle are you talking about, dear? I can think of more than one way I want to tussle…"

"I'm sure," Miriki replied. "I have that effect on most women. It's nice to see that even against other practitioners of the Way of the Open Mouth, I still have it." Suddenly, Kame noticed a spicy taste in his mouth that hadn't been there before. He frowned and touched his lips, but seconds later dropped the hand, realizing what was going on.

 _Miriki wants me to do something_ , he concluded. _Attack her? I guess someone has to break the standoff…_ He surreptitiously dropped a hand down to his right pants pocket, extricating a smokebomb, and then folding it in on itself over and over. In terms of quick releasing, the more dense the projectile, the easier it was to throw from an awkward position. Meanwhile, his other hand dropped behind his back, using a sheet of paper he'd folded into an airplane but then unfolded, making the task of putting it back into that airplane shape a lot simpler.

Meanwhile, Miriki was still at it, now seemingly starting to run out of steam. "So, anyway, how are thing with you? Is the human slave trade working out?"

Kirai frowned. "What-"

"It must be, if someone as smart and capable as you is doing it." Miriki smiled at her, but his eyes flashed over to Kame briefly. "We should do this more often. Do you want to go get dinner after this?"

Kirai opened her mouth to respond, but quickly closed it and narrowed her eyes in annoyance. "I've had just about enough of this for now. We can talk as much as you want once you're in my dungeon and the betrayer," she jerked her head towards Kame, "is dead."

Miriki shrugged. "Alright. So, about Orochimaru…" he fanned himself with a hand. "What a hunk, am I right?"

Kame knew his friend well enough to be expecting something like that, but Kirai evidently was not, as she untensed most of her body, confusion spreading onto her face. "What the f-"

That was all the opening he needed. Kame launched the now-tiny balled up smokebomb, setting it off about three-quarters of the way towards his foe, immediately following it up with an activation of his cursemark's first and second stages, finishing with the airplane. Kirai had leaped up in response to the spreading smoke, but her movements lagged from the surprise attack and Kame's explosive flew straight and true. One handsign blew it up directly beside her chakra signature, which fell towards the ground.

 _It can't have been that easy_ , Kame thought disbelievingly. _Wait, oh right_. "Genjutsu Rel-"

"What the hell, dude?" Miriki elbowed him, interrupting his thought process. "I didn't want to flirt with that woman any longer than I had to, but you had me doing it for two goddamn hours before you _finally_ actually did something!"

"Sorry, I-" Kame stopped the instinctual apology. "Wait, what am I apologizing for? You were the one who didn't tell me anything about what you were planning to do! How was I supposed to know that's distraction banter and not just you being you?"

"Oh please!" Miriki folded his arms over his chest. "You know just as well as I do that my standards are much higher than that six-out-of-ten hag."

"Hag?" Both genin turned to see Kirai flapping, evidently hurt from the explosion but not down for the count. She gestured towards herself, looking down at the demonic armor she was wearing: "Six-out-of-ten!? How _dare_ you insinuate that I'm beneath you?" She took a deep breath like she was about to rant. "I am the chosen of Orochimaru himself, his greatest ally, and you think that I'm-"

Then her talking cut off abruptly, replaced by grim proclamation of: "Wind Style: Relentless Flurry." A surging wave of air that blasted into Kame and Miriki both, flinging them back into the wall and continuing to press them against it. While using one hand to apparently keep up the barrage of wind, Kirai produced a kunai in the other and flung it into the windstream. It accelerated rapidly and Kame had to use most of his strength in order to budge his leg just enough to avoid taking the blade.

"Get ready, Kame," Miriki said through gritted teeth. Kame frowned- _What is he talking about?_ \- but nonetheless prepared himself mentally for whatever was about to happen. Kirai casually flung out another kunai, this one narrowly missing Kame's arm, but suddenly jerked in midair and apparently lost control of her jutsu. With the warning he'd received, Kame was quick to rise to his feet and launch a few odd shuriken towards the temporarily weakened Kirai.

Kirai spat, then frowned, and then straightened and dodged the shuriken just in time. "That's a weak excuse for a genjutsu."

Miriki shrugged. "Hey, I'm not pinned up against a wall anymore."

"Don't tell me you didn't enjoy it at least a little bit," Kirai said, now apparently completely back in control of her faculties and temper. "I've seen a hundred boys like you- you're looking for someone like _me_ to show you how fun it can be to give up."

Kame frowned in confusion at his longing gut reaction to her words; the banter that had previously been merely annoying to him was now sounding oddly enticing. _Is this her backup for when the enslavement genjutsu doesn't work? It's like Miriki, but with an added mental push for resistant people_.

However, aware as he was, hopefully he wouldn't fall to the siren call. Tuning out, he began folding in his hands and balling up Wind chakra behind him using his cursemark's second stage, barely registering her continued words: "Give in. Stop fighting and just let yourself join my side. I promise you'll enjoy a life with me…"

Kame finished his folded paper shuriken, six of them, three made from firebombs and three from normal explosives. At the same time, all three condensed Wind chakra clumps behind his back became ready, so all he really needed before launching his attack was information on what Miriki-

 _Oh, no_ … Kame's teammate was currently walking towards Kirai with a dumbfounded expression on his face. _Shit_ , Kame thought tightly, rapidly trying to figure out a way to snap his teammate out of it without giving up his own attack- unfortunately, with his chakra and hands otherwise disposed, there was nothing he could think to do.

 _Wait, I can still…_ "Miriki! You have to wake up!" Kame knew it was a long shot, but was still slightly let down when his friend didn't show any sign of response.

Kirai laughed. "Stronger ninja than you have failed to break my charms. Your little friend had already seen how hopeless your situation is…"

At the mention of Miriki, Kame's eyes flickered back over to his ally. Miriki was now at the edge of the balcony, looking up at Kirai with an expression of complete worship on his face, one arm outstretched towards her as she moved towards him. His other arm was behind his back, one finger slightly waving towards Kame-

He was beckoning. _Does that mean he's faking being caught? Or actually trapped, and asking for help?_ Either way, Kame had to do something immediately or both of their lives would be forfeit, so he decided to trust that his teammate had things under control and began to stride forward, dragging the condensed chakra behind him.

Kirai reached Miriki and stretched out an arm to touch the boy's face, which Miriki followed with his own hand on her arm, but just before she made contact, he snapped his fingers together around her armored forearm and yanked her towards him. With a shout of surprise, she tumbled forward, landing in a crouch and turning back towards Miriki with murder in her eyes…

But now she was close enough for Kame to go to work. He closed his eyes in concentration briefly before sending forward one his of paperbomb shuriken towards Kirai's stomach. Miriki dove away from her, clearing the area for Kame to be able to let loose, while Kirai was still unsteady. She narrowed her eyes, but off-balance as she was, she chose to dodge it rather than deflect it, twisting to let it fly a meter or so past her. _Big mistake_.

Kame detonated his bomb and caught her in the blast, sending her flying slightly forwards and to the side. Taking the damage far more readily than he'd expected, her eyes actually flashed as she altered course in midair to come towards him, hand outstretched and ready to end the fight-

But Kame already had one of his condensed wind-chakra balls held slightly in front of him and when she was millimeters away, he released it. The resulting blast of force sent him flying backwards, far from her, while she slammed into the stone ground hard enough to send little cracks through it. The resilience of her cursemark was not to be underestimated, though, and she stood up with only the faintest hint of being weakened.

Miriki was now behind her, leaning on the railing with a smug expression. "Oi, Kame, can we hurry it up? This is starting to bore me."

Kame growled and Kirai half-turned, indignant again, but Kame's kunai was deflected as she didn't quite take the bait and turned back around just in time. "What, is that it?" She began making handsigns, some sort of wind jutsu, and Kame narrowed his eyes, preparing his other two condensed wind blasts just in case he needed to dodge something.

All of a sudden, Kame felt a sweet taste in his mouth- too sweet, like pure sugar. Looking over at Miriki, the other boy betrayed no signs of having done anything, leaving Kame confused as to why he'd…

 _Wait_. Kame narrowed his eyes, remembering the close call seconds ago where she'd nearly touched his face. Miriki's go-to taste to incite action was spicy, so the change to sweet meant he was trying to get some other sort of message across. Could Kame have been caught in the enslavement genjutsu?

He hesitated, the two balls of wind chakra floating in the air behind him. For him to gather his chakra in the requisite pattern to perform genjutsu release, he'd have to abandon them both and essentially waste his entire Stage Two. Did he really trust Miriki's judgement that much?

 _Yes, I do_ , he decided, dropping the chakra and dampening his own inner chakra to almost nothing. "Genjutsu Release," he whispered, and suddenly everything changed.

He was standing facing Miriki, kunai drawn, apparently during a pause in fighting. Kirai's quiet flaps sounded like they were behind him at the moment, and her voice trailed out: "Do it, slave. Pin him down so he can join my little collection."

Kame's eyes next turned towards Miriki, who was also wielding a kunai, and his expression was unchanged. However, the sweet taste was gone without Kame having dispelled it by swallowing, meaning that Miriki knew about the situation as well.

That gave Kame the confidence to charge forward and engage Miriki in taijutsu, trading knife blows. Like all the practice rounds, Kame came out on top very easily and disarmed Miriki within seconds, knocking his former teammate to the floor and holding the kunai at his throat. Now Kirai's voice was closer and more triumphant: "Can't you see? Fighting me is pointless." Kame tried to mentally judge the distance, hoping that his hearing was accurate. "Just give in, and let me take care of _everything_ , forev-"

When she came close enough for her outstretched arm to enter Kame's field of vision, he swung his own arm back and buried the kunai into her torso. She choked on her words and then shouted in pain, but Kame had already drawn a paperbomb from his pouch and swung his other arm around to slap it onto the side of her waist while she was still shocked. The hand that had held the kunai was now gathering Wind chakra as he rolled forward and away from her grasp, finally turning to see her incensed and breathing heavily, bleeding from a deep stomach wound.

"You little piece of scum…" she trailed off, clutching the stomach wound, but to Kame's horror began to straighten up. "But, no matter. You might have gotten lucky there, but the fact remains that you can't handle me. You'll be lucky to last another thirty seconds, no matter what little tricks you try to pull."

"That's what she said," Miriki noted from the ground.

Kirai turned towards him, distracted enough for a half-second for Kame to raise his arm unnoticed and release the Wind chakra there: "Wind Style: Gale Force Jutsu." She was launched flying, as was he, and his landing was a lot rougher than her careful midair repositioning with her wings, but it didn't matter, because he raised one hand and made the sign to detonate his paperbomb point-blank on her waist.

The difference between a point-blank detonation of a paperbomb and the earlier blast that had caught her at its edge was stark. This time, Kirai didn't even have enough time to speak again before being enveloped in a brilliant blast of red and orange flame, leaving behind only tattered remains of her clothes and a few body parts when the smoke cleared.

Before celebrating, Kame made the signs one last time: "Genjutsu Release," but nothing changed and he allowed himself a sigh of relief. Miriki stood to match him and nodded towards their slain foe.

"What a pity. I was lying before, she was at least a eight-out-of-ten-"

Kame shook his head, allowing the tiniest smile to creep onto his face before he laughed. In that moment, Miriki's usually grating humor seemed like the funniest thing in the world to him, so he just let it all out. When he finally finished chuckling and pulled out the paper tracker, he found that the upper level had almost been completely cleared of cursemarked ninja, while the lower level's signatures had all mostly grouped up to hide.

It took a few minutes for them to meet up with the other two shinobi in their party and catch each other up on details, before they turned their attentions to the final objective in the base: the researchers. Another few minutes passed where they trailed down long tunnels, passing by rooms full of scrolls and even some experiments, before finally arriving at what seemed to be a larger hall of sorts.

The door was resistant for a few seconds before Haku kicked it off its hinges to reveal a huddled mass of scientists and their servants, looking at the Shinobi Union squad like they were demons come to life- which was a little strange, considering Kame and Haku's cursemarks had both run out by this point.

Kame made a few handsigns but faltered when one of the men towards the front of the group spoke in a pleading voice: "Please, spare us! We didn't hurt anybody!" A few more pleas joined the chorus, and Kame was filled with doubt- _Can I really do this? Execute a bunch of helpless people?_

For once, Haku was the one yanking him down to brutal reality. "Tandoki," she said, and it was enough for Kame- the reminder of the little girl whose family had probably been murdered, who'd been experimented on to provide results for these people, was the tipping point.

He made the signs and then breathed out fire chakra into the room: "Fire Style: Burning Ash Jutsu." The scientists began to move- some backing away, some towards the door, and some simply remaining frozen in confusion- but it didn't matter; none were fast enough to avoid Kame next little spike of fire chakra out of his fingers that ignited the cloud of ash. The room was instantly filled with searing flames that lasted only a few moments, but by the time they were gone, only charred corpses were left.

Kame noted the horrified expressions of Miriki and Awadatsu to his left, but was more focused on staring at the deaths he had just personally inflicted. _This is my punishment_ , he thought, _I will take responsibility for-_

Haku's hand pulled him away from his silent penance. "No," she said, looking into his eyes in a way that made him think she knew exactly what he'd been thinking, "Stop. They might not have been fighting you there, but they knew about evil and let it happen. You can't beat yourself up over everything, Kame."

Kame only nodded, doing his best to follow her advice as they trekked back out of the base and towards their next destination: the Hidden Mist.


	52. Arc 5 Vol 9: Vacation

**(A/N) The new computer did not work out. After a month and a half of dealing with tech support, troubleshooting, and budgeting issues, plus (I'll be honest) a week of some of the worst writer's block I've ever experienced, I gave in and wrote this chapter out on my phone. After the stuff that happened the last few times I promised, I'm hesitant to make any promises about updates, but I can guarantee that I'll never let such a long time between chapters pass ever again. Right now, I'm shooting for one chapter per week, maybe more.**

* * *

 _Alright, I'll admit it_ , Kame thought, _the ocean sucks_. Upon arrival at the massive expanse of water that encompassed much of the Land of Water, he'd had some decently high hopes. In fact, even walking up to the boat he'd been convinced that taking a ship would be a novel experience.

Unfortunately, the combination of remembering that he couldn't swim and realizing that, apparently, he got seasick very easily, left him where he was now: sitting on the deck of a merchant's ship, unwilling to go to the edge for fear of falling off but unwilling to retreat belowdecks for fear of throwing up. Instead, he sat there and wondered how he could possibly stay like this for another six hours before they finally arrived at their destination; a small island that served as a shipping hub.

There they would have to charter a ship to go to Orochimaru's lair, which was located on a rocky spit of land that was considered uninhabited by the Mist. The lair itself was accessible only by moving a massive, _massive_ hunk of rock, easily forty meters wide and thick, a task that was normally accomplished via earth-style ninjutsu from within. However, in this instance, Kame was fairly sure that their ex-compatriots wouldn't be rolling out the welcome mat, and getting through that huge obstacle would be an issue.

An issue that he realized he would not be having time to think through, as a familiar and yet still jarring voice came from behind him: "Hey, Kame, how's it going?"

 _It's not fair_ , Kame whined internally, glancing back at his teammate who looked, if anything, _more_ healthy on the ship, sea breeze tousling his hair. Awadatsu had grown up in a port town, Haku seemed too resilient to be brought low by simple seasickness, but Miriki… Miriki looked far too comfortable for someone who'd had exactly the same level of experience as Kame.

He continued with a hint of patronizing pity in his tone: "Anyway, I just wanted to talk about the fight from a couple days ago, the one against… what's her face? The six-out-of-ten?"

"Kirai?" Kame asked, then regretted it as a surge of nausea swelled back up and quieted him back down.

"Was that her name? Eh, whatever. Look: I think that after what happened, this is a good chance to talk about how we can work better together." _What?_ Kame hoped his confusion was visible, as voicing it wasn't worth it at the moment. _Is this seriously Miriki right now? When has he ever actually been serious about this kind of thing?_ "So obviously the problem is clear; you can't seem to improvise very well."

 _Oh._

Miriki continued with the tiniest little hint of a smirk beneath a mask of calm consideration. "See, the thing is, I came up with four solid opportunities for you to get her, and you only actually did something in… what, two of them? Maybe three? Meanwhile, you made one plan, and I totally figured it out and went along with it right away."

 _You bastard_ , Kame thought furiously, _now I realize why the hell you started this. You just wanted to get this talk out the way while I couldn't argue back._

"Anyway, I guess the takeaway here is that you need to work on team strategy." Miriki's grin finally broke through- _Even he can't say that with a straight face_ , Kame thought sourly.

"Shut… up…" Kame finally responded through gritted teeth.

Miriki reigned in his expression back to feigned seriousness. "Okay, fine. Look, I'll take _some_ of the blame here. The important thing is that we make some ground… if we're gonna be working together, we need to actually be able to… well, work together."

For a brief moment, Kame's gut reaction was continued annoyance that Miriki was actually trying to take the high ground of maturity, but he quelled that instinct as best as he could. If he had learned anything, it was to stop judging Miriki of all people so harshly, and as his eyes picked up the slightest waver of the other boy's composure, Kame realized that this was new ground. _He's treating me like an equal and starting a conversation he probably doesn't care about for my peace of mind. The absolute least I can do is meet him halfway…_

Of course, he only got through a few words: "We need to… come up with… code-" and then the rest was cut off as he stifled a dry heave.

Thankfully, Miriki got the gist of it. "Yeah, you're right. I definitely need to make it easier for you to understand my complex strategies. Maybe some kind of code to keep the bad guys guessing?"

"S'what I just…" Kame made one last effort to respond and immediately regretted it, lapsing back into silence as Miriki just kept talking.

"Well, if we're gonna try to make something as endless as my skill simple enough for you to understand-" Miriki paused briefly and then added "No offense" halfheartedly before continuing: "So here's how it's gonna work. If I want you to attack, I'm gonna put a spicy taste in your mouth, if I want you to run away I'll do… I don't know, bitter? And if I want you to chill out, it'll be sweet."

Kame immediately thought of several issues with that plan, not least of which included the previously enormous chakra drain of Miriki using his kekkeigenkai. Moreover, those three options were incredibly vague and he could already think of many situations in which they wouldn't work, most obviously the tense negotiations of their fight against Kirai. If that kind of interaction, where Kame needed to know the actual details of Miriki's plan, were to arise again, then they'd be just as unprepared-

For once, Miriki's tendency to pick up on Kame's more… _frantic_ thoughts didn't actually annoy him, although to be fair, it was likely only because it spared him from having to attempt to give voice to those thoughts in his weakened state.

"Look, I'm sure we can figure out something better, but we get to port soon and from then on I don't exactly think we're gonna have time to come up with something more complicated." At this point, Miriki's tone had become all business, the slight edge of humor gone for the moment- but it returned far more rapidly than it had fled. "Come on, this isn't fun. You're supposed to deal with the boring planning stuff. I'm sure you can figure out the details of what I mean from the situation when the time comes. Am I really _that_ confusing?"

And it was that question that finally tempted Kame into pushing himself just a fraction too far. He managed to squeak out "Yes" before promptly having to charge to the railing of the ship and empty his stomach, even as the first little specks of land came into view.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

"Hey, Miriki?"

"Yeah?"

"I…" Kame hesitated one last time, but quickly overcame his second thoughts. "I think you should handle this one."

Miriki didn't even blink, he simply nodded and stepped off towards the doors of the tavern with Awadatsu trailing in his wake. Kame was left standing outside with a fair bit more confidence than he'd thought he'd have, but that wasn't saying much. _Still_ , he reasoned with himself, _if there's one thing I need to be able to trust him with, it's people. We need a person to take us to a place they think is uninhabited, and he's better than me at this kind of thing_.

He tensed for all of half a second when he felt someone touch his side, but almost immediately registered the familiar pressure and the person behind it. A slight turn revealed Haku with a slight smile that belied a greater understanding of what had just occurred between her two teammates, making Kame feel slightly self-conscious.

"What?"

She ducked her head, saying: "Nothing. Just…" but trailing off before replacing the knowing smile with a simpler one. "Wasn't the ocean awesome?"

"Uh…" Kame genuinely didn't know how to answer that one.

Thankfully, he didn't have to, because Haku shook her head and laughed. "Kidding, kidding."

That proved enough to break Kame out of his overseriousness, and it also coincided with him realizing that the last traces of seasickness were, as far as he could tell, gone. For the first time in a while, he actually felt comfortable and… calm. Calm enough to look around the port and wonder "Hey Haku, do you want to go see if there's anything interesting here?"

She nodded and with that they were off. The island- _Anzen_ , Kame remembered it was called- served as a sort of halfway point for travelers going to the Hidden Mist, and for that reason Kame noticed an unusual number of ninja scattered throughout the small town.

However, his ingrained habit of tensing up around legal shinobi seemed to be gone, at least for the moment, so when Kame noticed a weapons shop he altered course towards it immediately. Stepping through the doors, he found himself looking at a surprisingly pristine store, given the general grime of the town outside, and his pleasant surprise only grew as he inspected the weapons themselves. Everything was of excellent quality, good enough to cause him to consider actually spending some of his money (a modest sum that he'd amassed from various unrelated sources during his time as a Sound ninja) and making some purchases. The shop had three or four other customers within it, all Mist shinobi, which was another mark in its favor.

After testing the weight of some kunai, Kame's attention was drawn towards the back wall, which was covered by paperbombs that could be bought in varying bulk. A quick glance at the seals was enough to confirm for him that the majority of the bombs were of standard make, although towards the right end there were a few types with combinations of timing and trigger mechanisms that he hadn't come across before. One in particular sparked his interest: two bombs, set to go off with separate triggers, one atop the other. _The first one is to drop peoples' guards_ , he realized as he peeled them apart to see that the second had a much more powerful explosion.

"Find everything all right?" A voice trailed from the shop counter, which brought Kame's eyes over to see a grinning elderly shopkeeper. "Ain't seen you 'round here before. You new?"

Kame blinked a few times before responding. "…Yeah."

"Good, good," the man said, stroking a long beard, "You let me know if you need somethin."

"Okay," Kame said, turning back to the paperbombs. However, his rebellious mind that was growing more accustomed to his new situation of being accepted obeyed an impulse and had him talking before he could think about keeping a low profile: "Sorry, I was just- uh, you have some paperbombs here that I haven't seen before."

The man grinned wider, seemingly happy to talk about his wares. "Yup! We got your normal types, 'course, but yessiree we do also have some more interestin stuff."

"Why?" Kame asked. None of the stores in the Hidden Sand had bothered to carry paperbombs of the diversity and complexity that this tiny island's shop did.

"Started with one guy, what you'd call a specialty customer, but I realized pretty quick that makin' these things is hard enough. Figured I might as well make as much money as I could off 'em, right?"

"Makes sense," Kame replied, finally letting his guard down and allowing the man's infectious smile to draw one from him in response. "Have you tried using different kinds of chakra? Changes of nature, I mean?"

"Oh yes," the shopkeeper said, stepping out from behind the counter to proffer a hand. "By the way, my name's Chorosi."

Kame looked at the hand for a few seconds before it occurred to him to shake it. "Oh. Oh! I'm Kame, Kame Hakiara. Nice to meet you."

Half an hour later, Kame was fishing out a lot more of his ryo than he'd originally intended, eyeing a stack of paperbombs on the counter before him as well as a travel set of craftsman's tools. Chorosi's ideas in some areas far outstripped Kame's own and his two natures, water and lightning, both produced paperbomb varieties that Kame was not familiar with. _Although I will be soon_ , he thought as Chorosi slid his cash register shut and turned the ever-present smile back towards him.

"Thanks for swingin' by!"

Kame pulled out one of his three storage scrolls and released the seal, allowing the container within to burst into being with a small scatter of smoke. Loading the purchases into it proved a little more difficult than he'd thought, mostly because his organized dividers had no place for these brand-new types of bombs, but he figured it out quickly enough. Finally it was only the crafting set left on the counter, and that too disappeared into his pack.

Surprisingly, Haku stepped up beside him and laid down a few items of her own: a pair of boots and patches of reinforced cloth and metal that Kame couldn't identify. Her bill came up to less than his own, but rather than pack her things up she moved to put them on; first the boots to replace her own worn pair, then she wrapped the cloth- bracers, Kame realized- around each of her forearms, with the metal plates facing opposite her palms.

All of those thoughts flew right out the window when Kame saw a new customer enter the shop, recognizing first the massive weapon strapped to the man's back, then the distinctive armor. "Haku, this might be a problem," he muttered under his breath to her.

"Shibuki! You're late," Chorosi said to the man while rummaging under his counter for something, finally popping up over it with a large crate of what looked to be paperbombs. "I got your order right here."

Shibuki barely spared Kame and Haku a glance as he stepped up to receive his goods. _Is it possible that he doesn't recognize me?_ Kame dared to let his guard down and start to walk out the door, only to have the paperbomb-covered edge of the Explosive Blade brought to bear inches before his face. Shibuki, still not even looking at them, growled in measured tones: "I'm on vacation, my one vacation per year, and I don't want to spend it dragging you two back to the Hidden Mist. Because of that, I'm gonna to choose to ignore you two, but if you pull anything, I will _personally_ hunt you to the ends of the earth. Understood?"

"Under…" Kame swallowed. "Understood."

The blade dropped, allowing Kame and Haku to exit towards the docks they'd originally come from. Kame's spirit lightened when he spotted a familiar figure in white standing right at the entrance, and lightened even further when said figure in white spotted him:

"Hey, guys! Guess who got us a boat?" Miriki shouted, pointing towards a massive floating fortress. Kame had a brief moment to wonder about how Miriki had gathered that particular one before he noticed the man standing behind Miriki and Awadatsu- a huge man, larger than Shibuki himself, who was clad in a ragged coat that came down past his knees and stood there with crossed arms.

A few more details came into focus as Kame closed the final bit of distance: the man with Miriki had to be in his forties or fifties and everything about him looked grizzled, from his unruly beard to the rough and scarred skin of his hands. In addition, he had two massive metal things strapped to his back, although Kame couldn't tell what they were from his angle.

"Good job, Miriki," Kame said with what he hoped was a convincingly serious face, "Never doubted you for a second."

Miriki just smiled back with knowing eyes that clearly said, _Yes you did_ , and that was the end of Kame's straight face. The facade cracked as he laughed, only laughing harder when Miriki joined in, but eventually he composed himself enough to incline his head in deference to the man, who he assumed to be the provider of the boat.

"Hello. I am Kame-"

"-Hakiara, I know," the man said. "I'm Shunsetsu." He narrowed his eyes in Kame's direction, but after a few seconds Kame realized the man was actually looking over his shoulder. Turning around to see what the subject of Shunsetsu's attention was, Kame was totally unprepared for a massive metal object to suddenly come flying from behind him, off towards the dock entrance, followed by a trailing chain that stretched back to its origin.

Only when it slammed into the stone of the street with a massive noise of impact, throwing up chunks of rubble, did Kame get a good enough glimpse to identify it as a ship's anchor. Slightly incredulous, he turned to see Shunsetsu with one arm outstretched and the chain going from his back up along his arm. A large hand grabbed hold of the chain and then Shunsetsu yanked _hard_ , hard enough to go flying off towards the docks' entrance twenty meters away, while Kame could only gape.

"Miriki, who is this guy?" Kame probed his friend.

Miriki seemed to mull it over for a second, then finally responded: "Okay, he's a self-employed treasure hunter, and he agreed to help us in exchange for free pickings of whatever's in the base."

Awadatsu snickered at that, which set Kame's innate Miriki-lie sensor on red alert, but it was Haku who seemed to figure it out first: "Miriki, is the treasure that he hunts the property of other people?"

Awadatsu nodded, and it all clicked for Kame. "So he's a pirate."

"No, he's a sea-faring property manager," Miriki said, not a trace of mirth on his face. "In that he manages other people's property for them indefinitely."

Maybe it was just the general building gloom Kame'd been dealing with giving him more appreciation for dark humor, but that one got an honest laugh out of him- only for that laugh to stop when Shunsetsu's low grumble came back into earshot. It was now accompanied by a similar semi-familiar voice: Shibuki. "What're those kids doing, Shunsetsu?"

"They're clients. Be nice," Shunsetsu responded, which drew Shibuki to shoot Kame an infuriated look before speaking again.

"What'd they hire you to do?"

"Break into a Sound base," Shunsetsu said.

Shibuki turned a death glare upon Kame and said "They're Sound ninja, and they're leading you into a trap." He unslung the Explosive Blade from his shoulder and shook his head, uttering out "I did warn you" through gritted teeth.

"Now, hold on, there's a perfectly reasonable explanation for-" Kame's protest was cut off by the Explosive Blade sweeping up towards him, forcing him to detonate his emergency Windbomb on his chest to send himself flying backwards.

It was Miriki who ended up actually managing to get through to the angered member of the Seven Swordsmen. "We're done with Orochimaru!" was enough to bring pause, which he then exploited to deliver the rest of the information: "We're done with Orochimaru- or, they are at least- and… okay, there was a lot of politics involved, but long story short we got sent on a mission to wipe out what's left of his stuff."

Shibuki didn't fully drop his guard. "You're lying."

In response, Miriki reached into a pouch on his belt and drew out a folded piece of paper, then tossed it to the man. Kame half-expected Shibuki to blow it out of the air, but instead he caught and read it briefly as Miriki narrated: "That's the documentation from the hearing. There are multiple Kage seals on that thing, one of which is your own Mizukage's, and it explains exactly what I just said."

Shibuki let out a long breath but finally straightened up and snapped the sword onto his back, tossing the paper back towards Miriki. Miriki reached out to catch it and _missed_ , nearly letting the vital piece of paper fall straight into the sea water, but luckily Haku was fast enough to dive for it and reach an arm over the edge to snag it just in time.

Meanwhile, Shunsetsu, who'd been quiet the whole time, just grunted and stepped off towards his ship. "Get on board, everyone. You coming, Shibuki?"

"…Yes, brother," Shibuki finally said, trailing his… brother?

 _Wait, what?_ Kame narrowed his eyes as he realized that one of the champions of the Mist, a member of the Seven Swordsmen, was the brother of a pirate. _Hold on a minute, they were planning to meet up anyway, which means…_

However, as the genin stepped on board, any of those thoughts were quickly erased from his mind and replaced with an internal moaning as he tried to keep what little was left in his stomach from following the rest into the sea.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

The seasickness kept Kame from really participating in the planning or discussion. He tried his best to at least listen and in the end, as they approached the rocky cliff face that concealed an entrance to their objective, he hd a full grasp of what the plan was.

Unfortunately, that was probably for the worse, as the conversation had gone about as one would expect; Miriki using a lot of words to say essentially nothing, Haku's occasional useful contributions getting talked over, Awadatsu not really understanding enough to contribute meaningfully, and the Mist brothers using all of their combined cunning to come up with the greatest battle plan ever conceived: a direct frontal assault.

"Alright, boys, it's time to give 'em hell!" Shunsetsu was standing on the very bow of the ship, which had a metal armor probably designed for… ramming… things…

 _Wait, there's no way that he's actually going to-_ but he was, because the ship showed no signs of stopping or slowing down as it came closer and closer to the rock wall. _What the hell!?_ Haku had explained the basic floor plan well enough, and the rock walls may have been only six feet thick or so, but still, ramming into them seemed like an exceedingly stupid idea. _Oh, shit_ , Kame thought as they closed the final twenty meters or so, _What a stupid way to die_.

Then they hit the wall, but rather than stopping or shattering like he'd expected, the iron ram held firm and punched right through, even keeping some momentum to the point that they retained momentum. As the defenses around it crumbled, the ship listed slightly but drifted forward into the cavern, giving Kame a moment to glance around and take note of what was going on inside the docking bay of the base.

Due to its function as a storehouse, as well as its location in the middle of the ocean, the base had to incorporate a place for ships to be docked. As a result, the majority of the base consisted of a massive hollowed-out cavern, the walls spiderwebbed with catwalks and carved-in living quarters. The only other major portion was the vault itself, but that was another issue entirely that would have to come after they dealt with the many minions currently frozen still and staring at them.

For the most part, the faces consisted of complete shock that the solid rock wall had just been penetrated- a few of the shocked expressions might have even been laughable if the situation weren't so deadly serious- but most of the confusion was soon replaced with panic or anger. Scattered voices started to shout alarms, but most of them were dwarfed by an oddly gleeful Shunsetsu:

"Take no prisoners!"

His point was underscored by the massive anchor he sent flying off towards one of the docking platforms, which sailed across fifteen meters of water and instantly crushed the unlucky target, even splintering a few inches deep into the wooden platform. That seemed to break the stalemate as Shunsetsu's ensuing yank on the chain that brought him flying off towards the dock was accompanied by attacks from all sides involved.

Kame, still feeling the remnants of his seasickness while the ship ground to a halt on the furthest stretch of wooden dock, groaned and weakly drew a kunai in case he needed it for defense. Attacks were coming fast and thick towards the ship, a mix of arrows, kunai, and spines from flying-type Cursemarked, but thankfully the elemental ninjutsu and paperbombs that would prove harder to defend against were yet to come.

Most of the crew, which consisted of both missing-ninja and well-trained civilians, began jumping ship onto the docks to follow their captain in his charge. Shibuki himself leaped off the side towards the water, disappearing momentarily, but then Kame heard the thunderous sound of the Explosive Blade being triggered and saw him go flying off towards the wall.

That left Miriki, Awadatsu, Kame, Haku, and a skeleton crew to defend the ship- at first, not really a tough task given that the rain of projectiles was slowing to a trickle. However, Kame soon saw why as hordes of underlings began raining from the walls down into the water. _Shit, that's right, this base has the-_

"Look out! They turn into amphibious soldiers!" He tried to warn the crew and struggle to his feet, still in no shape to actually fight anything. _If I could just get another minute or two…_ but unfortunately, his time was up. Splashes from all around the boat heralded the veritable army of Cursemarked swarming up onto it, each one with the same monstrous features: widened jaws with row after row of shark teeth, clawed, lengthened digits on their hands and feet with webbing, and skin patched with scales.

Thankfully, they were more of the same when it came to intelligence. Their fighting, while fast and vicious, was not particularly skilled, their teamwork nonexistent, and so the crew members were able to take them on-

For the most part. One of them shouted out in pain as an enemy that he'd assumed dead suddenly animated and bit down on his leg. Whether due to his resulting fall or the blood being spilled, all of the Cursemarked on deck rushed him with snarls and obscured him in a mass of blood, teeth, and claws.

Kame heard a stifled noise from beside himself and turned to see Miriki paling rapidly and visibly trembling. _Right, he hasn't_ … Kame, Haku, hell, even Awadatsu had been witness to the extremes of Orochimaru's cruelty, but Miriki had no such preparation. That was never clearer than now, when seeing someone eaten alive rendered the Kosuki boy seriously drained. _Maybe it says something about the rest of us that we can see that and shrug it off_ , Kame wondered, but that was a thought for another day.

"Miriki!" Kame said, finally shaking off the worst of his seasickness and taking command of his teammate, "We need to get off the ship." Haku was trading bone-shattering blows with the Cursemarked, but one slip-up could spell disaster. Penned in as they were, they'd be perpetually surrounded if they didn't find a way to leave soon.

"Uh…" Miriki blinked a few times, then his eyes flashed back into a full awareness. "Oh. I…"

Kame threw his kunai at a Cursemarked that was particularly vulnerable and drew two more to replace it, all while continuing his stream of instructions. "Miriki! I have a plan, but it needs you to work."

"Of course it does," Miriki responded with a smirk finally coming back to his features. "Good luck trying to make a plan _without_ -"

"Good, you're back," Kame said as he loosed another kunai. "Now listen up. These things get vicious if they smell blood. They'll swarm it, understand?" Miriki nodded. "I'm gonna booby-trap the boat, then we ditch it while you leave behind a genjutsu of an injured person to draw them all in, got it?"

"Heh, you said boo-"

"Got it!?" Kame had to briefly turn his attention away as Haku retreated back into the raised area with her companions, breathing heavily.

"Do you two have a plan?" She asked.

Miriki beat Kame to the response: "Yep, I came up with one. Kame's gonna rig the boat to blow, then we leave it behind as a trap for all these monsters."

Haku raised an eyebrow, not particularly convinced of Miriki's claimed authorship of the plan, but then had to dart over to the ladder and slam a kick into the face of a Cursemarked that was scaling the thing. There was a short crunch of bone, then she launched it flying off the ship entirely, turning back around to respond: "Well?"

Kame hesitated one final time. "We need to figure out if we can… okay, we can't let anyone escape, right? We need to go over and guard the exit, but none of us can swim."

Awadatsu shook her head. "Naw, I can."

"So can I," Miriki added. At the two incredulous glances of his teammates that had grown up in the desert, he shrugged: "Hey, I've been on a lot of family trips to- you know what, nevermind, not important."

"You're right," Kame said. "Everyone knows their part of the plan, right?" Nods all around. "Good, then let's get to it."

Haku was already midair by the time his sentence was over, somersaulting forward before slamming a heel down onto the head of a Cursemarked hard enough to splinter the deck beneath its feet. Most of the enemies on deck turned to focus on her, which gave Kame time to draw a whole sheaf of maximum-power paperbombs and begin folding and launching them all over the deck while shouting warnings to the remaining crewmen. "Everyone, we're rigging the ship to explode! When I give the signal, you all need to run to the dock!"

"The captain's gonna kill you!" came the response, but other than that most of the others seemed to register it. Kame, not in the mood to argue over his plan, decided to ignore that dissenter and finish up with his liberal spread of paperbombs.

"Miriki?"

"On it." Miriki's eyes spun into their four-pointed state, after which the monsters on the dock all seemed to refocus their attention on a central point and began swarming it.

"Everyone off the ship, now! I'm setting off the explosives in ten seconds!" Kame leaped off towards the docks, crossing the large ship with a few long strides and giving momentary thanks that his enemies didn't even understand verbal communication. "Come on!"

One by one, people streamed off the ship, even as more and more Cursemarked clawed their way aboard. Miriki and Awadatsu jumped off the back towards the shattered entrance, leaving only Haku, who soon launched herself off of a Cursemarked and onto the dock beside Kame.

With a single handsign, the ship was ripped apart in a ball of fire, catching every monster on deck and even those in the water all around, sending a shower of splinters over Kame and his allies. The brief pause in the fighting gave Kame an opportunity to look around and take stock of everything else that had been going on. The general trend seemed to be that it was all going well.

Shibuki was cleaving wide swaths of the platforms with explosions from his sword and immolating rooms without even having to enter them. Shunsetsu, for his part, was still sending himself flying around like a madman- Kame watched an actual shinobi launch a few Earth jutsu at the man, all of which were batted aside by massive anchors. The Sound ninja turned to run, but an anchor buried itself in the ground before him and was soon followed by its master, who then dispatched the foe with a single brutal blow from his weapon.

The smaller battles between individual Sound forces and pirates were not as lopsided, but for the most part ended with more losses on the side of the Sound. Kame frowned as he looked over the bodies, searching for the more dangerous mercenary ninja but finding only run-of-the-mill henchmen and Cursemarked.

Then his attention was yanked back to the present as the waters around the dock they stood on began frothing moment before releasing more sharklike Cursemarked. As many as Kame's plan with the detonating ship had taken out, there seemed to be ever more of them, which made sense given that this base had to cover arguably the largest domain out of any of them, but was still annoying.

Kame drew five new recently purchased waterproofed paperbombs from his pocket and folded each into a shuriken shape, launching them one after another in a rough circle around himself down into the waters. He wasn't sure about how fast objects would sink, but Haku's blitz of attacks in a circle around him bought him enough time for them to drop to a safe distance (he hoped). After about ten seconds, he made the handsign-

 _Oh shit_ , he thought as the resulting explosions sent huge plumes of water spewing all over him and his allies. The harmless soaking, however, was far from his mind almost immediately, because the wooden stilts that the dock was built around began to buckle. _I didn't think this through! Shit! I can't swim!_

Without the presence of mind to gather the necessary chakra, Kame leaped up and backwards to tilt his body diagonally in the air, then detonated a weakened Windbomb on his back to launch himself towards the safe patch of dry land. _Dry, rocky land, that's coming at me way too fast-_

"Wind Style: Wind Cushion Jutsu!" Kame released a buffer of air that slowed him down sufficiently, landing on his feet and stumbling a few steps but managing to stay upright. However, when he looked up, he found himself staring into the eyes of a mercenary shinobi only a foot away from him, brandishing a kunai at the ready.

For some reason, in that moment Kame instinctively took a page out of Miriki's book and smiled weakly at his foe: "So, heh. Uh… how about we just talk about this?"

It bought him about two seconds, which was incidentally just enough time for Haku, with her Cursemark's second stage in full force, to teleport in and slam a fist into the mercenary's chest, hard enough to crush the man into the wall and shatter bones. Dead or alive, the man didn't stir after that, so Kame straightened up and nodded a simple thanks to Haku- after months together, they'd saved each other at the last minute enough times that they were past the point of spoken gratitude.

Still reluctant to use his own Cursemark's second stage, as his two-day recovery time was a lot longer than Haku's five-hour period, Kame drew two kunai, one with a paperbomb in the hilt and one without, and proceeded forward up a series of stair carved into the rock. Haku carved a path before him, as the thin stairway made a perfect battleground for her one-on-one skill to shine in repeated duels against Cursemarked foes. With that said, as they reached the end, Kame saw the makings of a trap in wait for them and muttered "Swap" to her while preparing a jutsu.

She turned and nodded, then backflipped over him to clear a path as the stairs opened up to a plateaued area that held no visible enemies. However, Kame knew from his time under Orochimaru that the situation was likely a lie- the plateau had trapdoors under several key patches of ground that led to hidden rooms, used for ambushes and stealth. Unfortunately for the enemies likely hiding down there, the airholes necessary for such a network were right beneath Kame's feet, and it was a simple matter for him to release his chakra as a smoke: "Fire Style: Burning Ash Jutsu."

This time he held the jutsu for longer, exhaling a massive amount of the stuff for about ten seconds until he saw the airholes on the far end of the plateau start to leak as well. Kame dropped a Firebomb and backed away from the killing field just as one of the trapdoors slammed open to reveal a Sound Shinobi hacking from smoke inhalation, and then the bomb went off and ignited the entire tunnel system with a muffled explosion noise.

Little tendrils of fire poked out from the airholes but the one open trapdoor was the only real indicator of the devastation that had just been wrought, as a pillar of flame roared out and caught the Sound Shinobi squarely within it. All in all, it was only a matter of moments before all that was left was trails of smoke leaking out of the graves of their would-be ambushers, leaving the path safe for Kame to tread forward.

Kame briefly remembered Miriki and turned around to glance all the way across the massive cavern, catching sight of the entrance that his friend had secured. For some reason, the tiny white-cloaked Kosuki appeared to be simply crouching on a piece of rubble beside Awadatsu's green, both unmoving, while the water beside them was polluted with a toxic bright green miasma. _Oh, I get it, acid in the water that Miriki disguises so enemies run right into it_ , Kame realized. _Smart_.

The head of this lair, Gatei, had engaged his unique squid-like cursemark and grown in size, now laying waste with eight ten-meter-long tentacles. Several pirates were crushed before the rest backed off, Shibuki blasting himself in to aid them and trading blows with the enemy with neither seeming to have a definitive upper hand at the moment.

Kame turned back to the tunnel at the end of the plateau, which he knew to lead to the vault, this base's real specialty, which held Orochimaru's considerable horde of artifacts and currency. A short dash took him to the massive iron structure in question, which had a door enhanced through seals that would only open for Orochimaru and a select few of his lieutenants.

The door was closed at the moment, but Kame didn't even hesitate as he stepped up and placed his hand on the seal at its center. He'd been on the short list of people authorized to open the door, and even though the Sound villages knew him to be an enemy now, Orochimaru remained dead and therefore his seals remained unchanged. Just as Kame had thought, the door clicked a few times and then slowly slid open to reveal a stockpile of Ryo, weapons, scrolls, and other items worth a ridiculous total amount of money.

 _If there's nobody left in here, then…_ Kame turned back around towards the fighting, jogging far enough to get a good look down towards the docks, just in time to watch Shunsetsu drop a good twenty meters and slam an anchor down directly into the body of Gatei's octopus form. The impact sent up a spray of water even larger than Kame's bombs had, but as the misty haze cleared, it revealed a blood pooling around a Gatei that was no longer in a Cursemarked state or even alive.

That seemed to be enough of a tipping point for the tide- _heh, tide_ \- of battle to turn in the favor of Kame's allies. As he traversed the stairs down towards the docks, he could see the last few dregs being cleared out by a thinned but surprisingly healthy pirate crew. Finally, he made it to Shunsetsu's side and spoke: "The vault's open. Take anything you want from it." That had been the agreement that Mirki had struck- the location of the base in exchange for everything within it.

Shunsetsu, whose wide grin hadn't wavered once since the start of their charge, raised a weapon into the air and roared "Alrighty boys, let's load up-"

He stopped talking and did a double take that was honestly comical to Kame before he realized what the origin of it was. Shunsetsu was staring at the smoking remnants of his ship with something fast approaching bloodlust in his eyes, and it was all Kame could do to take a step back before an expression that promised violent death was turned on him.

"You let them destroy my ship?"

"Heh, the thing about that is…" Kame scoured his mind for a suitable way to phrase the circumstances that had transpired, preferably one that ended up with him not crushed underneath a massive iron anchor.

One of the crewmen beat him to the punch. "The kid blew it up, captain."

Shunsetsu's eye twitched a few times while Kame's life flashed before his own eyes, yet salvation came from an unlikely direction: Shibuki took the opportunity to slam to the ground beside the two of them and interposed an arm between them. In his hand, he had a bottle with a ragged label Kame didn't quite recognize, yet-

"These bastards actually had a stash of the good stuff, brother. What say we celebrate, eh?" It took him a second or two, but Shibuki seemed to piece together the situation and then shook his head. "Look, you can build a better ship with the haul you got here. If you don't come soon, I'll have to down the entire stash- not that I'm complaining."

"Yeah, sure," Shunsetsu muttered, turning to follow his brother off in the direction of the alchohol stores. Kame breathed a long sigh of relief built up not just from the tense confrontation he'd just been in, but from the entire battle. _Three more bases to go_ , he thought, pulling out his little slip of paper that indicated not only that there were no Cursemark-bearing enemies within a few kilometers, but also that there were only 48 left to go.

 _Wait, 98?_ Kame looked around, because the last time he'd checked, there had been upwards of 500 enemies left for them to deal with. That may have been before the battle at the Hidden Lightning stronghold, but still- over those two fights, there was no way 450 people had been taken out. _Did a legitimate village destroy one of the bases? Or…?_

Kame felt Haku tap his shoulder in a familiar fashion, turning to see her smiling at him in a way that reassured him to his core. _I can worry about the other stuff later_ , he told himself, jerking his head off towards a growing mass of pirates breaking out the food stores of the base. "Looks like they're getting ready to celebrate, huh?"

Haku lightly pushed him on one shoulder, turning him towards the hubbub. "I think we've earned a good party."


	53. Arc 5 Vol 10: Cheap Melodrama

**(A/N) This is my first time ever really writing any kind of romance, so feedback would be highly appreciated.**

* * *

"I… Uh…" Kame's mouth felt dry all of a sudden. _Is this really a good idea_? He looked around the inside of the dimly lit bar, anything to avoid looking at the person he'd come to speak to in the first place.

Shibuki crossed his arms but didn't even bother to turn all the way around, instead replying over his shoulder. "What is it?"

 _Yeah, this was a bad idea_ , Kame thought, turning around to walk away, only to have his turn forcibly continued by Miriki's arm on his shoulder. As their eyes met, Miriki's intent was clear in his expression: _Don't chicken out_.

Kame swallowed and tried again, this time managing slightly better than before: "I… I was wondering if, before we make it to the next port… if I could…" _No, this is stupid_.

However, his gaze snapped back up at the man's next words. "Is it the sword?"

"Uh…"

Shibuki tilted his head skyward and shook it slowly. "How in the hell do you work with Orochimaru and come out like a socially awkward schoolgirl." That _was_ enough to get Kame riled up, but before he could protest, Shibuki's low chuckle cut him off. "You've been eyeing it since I met you- hell, I think I can remember you eyeing it back when we fought in the Mist."

"Yes," Kame replied, conceding that he may have done a worse job hiding his interest than he'd thought.

"I wondered why… actually, I wondered why 'til yesterday. Now I get it, you're some kind of paperbomb nerd, aren't you?"

"Yes." _I feel like I should be saying more_ , Kame reasoned, _but at the same time this one-word-answer thing is working so far so I think I'm just going to roll with it_.

"Funny enough, if you asked me yesterday I probably would've blown you into next week," Shibuki said. "Today, though… today, I'm actually on vacation, I'm filthy rich off of the haul you helped me get, and I'm a little more sure that you aren't gonna stab me in the back."

"Traitor!" Shunsetsu shouted from out on the docks. He was clearly not even close to forgiving Kame's destruction of his previous vessel, even though the money they'd looted would be enough to buy a new one ten times over.

Shibuki let a tiny hint of mischief flicker across his face before he replaced it with his usual calm. "You know what? Go for it," he said, unslinging the Explosive Blade from his shoulder. Kame reached out to accept it, but hesitated when he heard the attached warning: "Don't make me regret this, kid."

"I won't," Kame promised, desperately trying (and most likely failing) to suppress the gleeful smile from spreading across his face, only growing wider when the Explosive Blade's handle was offered to him. _Two hours until we leave for the Hidden Whirlpool_ , he thought, sitting down and activating his Cursemark's first stage in order to scan the chakra networks within the weapon in front of him.

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

After two hours that felt far too short and then another four hours on a merchant ship that were far too long, Kame stepped out onto the dry mainland with a smile that had not been quenched, even by his seasickness. In fact, his grin only strengthened as his nausea fell away, fueled in part by the fact that he could finally put the last four hours' worth of theorizing to work with his hands. _I guess I first have to cut out the metal shape_ , he considered, reaching into a pocket and pulling out both a kunai and a chakra blade.

With clear dimensions marked out in his mind, he began cutting away, only to stop as Awadatsu spoke to the entire group: "Anyway, I wanted to say thanks for takin' me this far, y'all," she said, stopping and putting her hands on her hips. "I think we're as close as we're gonna get to the Whirlpool Village."

"Huh?" Kame hadn't heard anything about this in the few days she'd traveled with them.

"Ah, darn, guess I forgot to tell you." Awadatsu shrugged, continuing in a cheerful tone, "Look, I was always gonna leave once y'all got around to the Whirlpool. Got no home left to go back to, so I figured I might as well try for a spot as a ninja there, right?"

"You're gonna ditch me with these losers?" Miriki asked, maintaining a face of outrage for a second or two before dropping it and going in for a hug. "Kidding, thanks for coming this far. Good luck with getting to be a Whirlpool ninja."

"Yeah, thanks," Kame echoed. _I feel like I should…_ he couldn't quite put words on it. _Be feeling something more, I guess. She's only been with us for a week, though_. He waved as she bounced off, trying and failing to conjure up any real emotion about her leaving, giving up once she disappeared between a few larger buildings.

Miriki, who might've been the most disappointed, didn't seem to be really affected either, as he was the first to step off in the direction of their intended target. The small port city that they stood in was the furthest south in the Land of Whirlpools, and incidentally also the closest to the Land of Whirlpools' base.

Turning his attention back to the tools in his hands, Kame began to cut away, only to be stopped once again, this time by Miriki's question of "So, what're we looking at this round?"

"What do you mean by that?" Kame's half-occupied mind didn't have the necessary deductive skills to piece together Miriki's intent at the moment.

The Kosuki boy just rolled his eyes. "What's this base? We've already messed up a library, a bank, a testing center, and a prison, right? So what're we about to attack?"

"Oh." Kame frowned, searching for the right descriptors. "It's sort of… I don't know, a bunker?" _If I'm being honest_ , he thought, _this is the one I've been dreading. While Orochimaru was alive, I wondered why he'd even have a base that seemed to serve the sole purpose of defending itself. Now I know… this is his failsafe for resurrecting_.

However, unwilling to voice those doubts, he instead opted to take a lighter tone. "It's a tougher one. If we end up attacking it, we're gonna have to go really deep underground and hope that they don't collapse the tunnel on us while we go in. Once we're there, this base also has a bunch of stronger Cursemarked fighters."

As they talked, they'd wordlessly taken a path leading towards the base, which was on the southern border of the Land of Whirlpools. Their merchant transporters had been kind enough to drop them off just outside of a town only a few kilometers from their destination, giving them an hour or two of travel time before they made it there.

The first question to actually make Kame cease his multitasking hands came from Haku: "Kame, how do you set off your paperbombs?"

"I…" He gathered his thoughts before responding. "I release a tiny chakra signal that each paperbomb is keyed to." She looked crestfallen at that, drawing out an urge from him to fix whatever had hurt her. "But that's not the only way, why do you ask?"

"Because I saw how you use them to move in emergencies or in midair, and I thought that might be useful," she replied. "But if that's not-"

"No, I can figure something out," Kame promised immediately. A small voice flickered into being in his head and reminded him of how he was already working on something, but it flickered out just as quickly when he put his current project away in his pack.

"Thank you," Haku said, seeming awkward all of a sudden. For a second or two she looked like she was hesitating to do something, but the moment passed and she opted just to smile at him, which was enough to convince him that dropping the knife project had been worth it. However, a new topic meant he'd have to start brainstorming, so he brought out his trusty old paper butterfly and began flapping its wings calmly and slowly, even as his mind drifted off to thoughts of paperbombs and seals.

By the time they reached their destination, Kame had a fairly good idea of what he could do, but actually implementing it would come later. "Okay, guys, this one's probably going to be to the most difficult to break into. It's surrounded by a few hundred meters of rock with seals to prevent jutsu plastered all over it, plus it's manned by a bunch of Orochimaru's strongest fighters- none of those animalistic ones we fought in the last few battles. These ones are loyal to him, which means he can give them stronger cursemarks, and they'll actually use strategy against us. Miriki, can you use a crow to scout things out?"

"Sure," Miriki complied, biting his thumb and running through the correct signs before calling out a slightly-larger-than-normal crow in front of him. "Hey, Rasujin. Go check out the rock formation up ahead and report back to me."

The crow soundlessly flapped up above the treeline and out of their sight, leaving them to wait for a minute or two before it returned, landing on Miriki's shoulder and speaking in the same squawking speech that its fellows had: "Wouldn't ya believe it, it's friggin' gone."

That didn't sound right to Kame. "Eh?"

"G-O-N-E gone, buddy. Nothin' but a crater up ahead, like I heard happened to the last place the scroll was kept."

The crow's observation made the pieces click into place in Kame's head. _Oh, shit_ , he realized, dread mounting in his heart as he rushed forward without concern for stealth anymore, _Did the Tanikage_ -

The last few trees finally gave way to the barren edge of a crater, walls made of smooth and melted slag. It stretched for at least a kilometer in width, leaving Kame no doubt any longer- not only was the Tanikage still alive, but he was active even recently. In fact, the sudden, non-team-eight related drop in the numbers of Cursemarked fighters that had happened a day or two ago now made sense to Kame.

Haku and Miriki stepped up to his sides, the latter seemingly having already dismissed his crow summon, and each reacted in their own way; Haku with the same uneasy silence as Kame, and Miriki with an impressed whistle. "Wow, that's impressive. Whoever did that must have…" he trailed off, turning to look at his two teammates intently for a moment, and when he spoke again it was in a much more somber tone. "The Tanikage, eh?"

Kame spared a glance to note that the Kosuki boy had activated his Hatogan and was probably already fully aware of the fears of Haku and him. "Yeah, he's… a problem."

Haku placed a hand on his shoulder, turning him slightly to face her. "We can't just ignore him forever, Kame."

 _We can't do anything about him_ , Kame thought, but he kept his voice as calm as he could: "I think we should head out for the Land of Fire, then, right?"

He started to walk off around the crater, towards the west that he knew held their next target, but faltered as Haku didn't let the subject drop. "Kame, we _can't just ignore him forever_."

"I know that."

"Do you?" Haku passed him and turned around, crossing her arms in a stance that suggested annoyance but with an expression of sympathy on her face. "We need to talk about what happened, and how we stop it from happening again."

"We can't," Kame responded. "He's completely out of our league. He punched through Orochimaru's strongest defense and killed him in one attack- he killed an entire village with one jutsu!" Contrary to his expectations, venting these feelings actually made Kame feel better, so he kept going: "Our only chance is to hope that he either forgot about us or decided we're not worth killing, and spending time thinking about how he could slaughter us at will is a waste."

Haku frowned, seemingly starting with something defiant but stopping herself before simply shaking her head. "I can't just ignore it. Maybe if we got the Kage to-"

"To what?" Kame didn't like speaking to her this brutally, but her line of thinking reminded him all too well of his nascent rage towards the system that had landed him in this mess. "We tried, remember? Look how well that turned out. They would have _executed_ us, Haku. They aren't our allies." That last bit had slipped out unintentionally, but Kame quickly realized that it was true- the legal villages didn't give a shit about their well-being.

All three of them slipped into silence for the next hour or two of walking, during which time Kame put in some practice on something else he'd been working on a while back- an earth change in nature. Wind, his natural affinity, had come somewhat easily to him, and fire had followed suite, but trying to unlock anything further had proven futile for the last year or so.

With that said, he ran through the all-too-familiar motions in his head, envisioning his chakra as the solid, immovable stone. Eventually, when they hit the road he knew to lead up towards the Leaf base, he shelved the ritual once more and moved on to another exercise. At his subtle signal, the scroll containing Emperor spat the massive puppet out onto the road before him, and he attached his chakra threads to the requisite points before beginning the motions of walking, one massive leg before the other. The learning curve had been incredibly steep in the early days, but now Kame was capable of at least walking the thing with reliable success, meaning he could now practice while traveling.

Miriki flinched just the tiniest bit and surreptitiously moved away from the area in front of Kame's puppet, but didn't make any comment, while Haku seemed as content as Kame was to be alone with her thoughts. They continued in relative silence for kilometers on end, passing only a few travelers on their route, none of them shinobi.

Eventually, as dusk fell, Kame reflected on their situation. They had seven days left to deal with two more bases, the Land of Fire and the Land of Sound. The Land of Sound was run by a skeleton crew- in fact, they probably wouldn't even have to go there, considering that the only person there was Grandmother, who probably had a complex cursemark like Kame, Haku, and the Sound Ninja Four. Those "higher-ranked" cursemarks had been exempted from the resurrection equation, presumably due to the desire of Orochimaru to retain his stronger minions when returning from the grave, but that selfishness would cost him dearly.

In a fit of excellent timing, they came across moderately large village in their path just as night began to set in. For once, keeping that nine-day timespan in his mind, Kame actually felt comfortable asking his teammates "Do you two want to stop here for the night?"

"Hell yes," Miriki immediately answered, talking right over Haku's quieter "Sure."

 _Then it's settled_ , Kame noted, scanning the city, which was down below the hill they stood on. From this distance, it was difficult even for his trained eyes to discern the location or number of possible places for them to stay, so he shrugged and decided to head in on foot. However, when they entered the village's limits, people seemed to be put off by something, which Kame couldn't-

 _Oh_ , he realized, _I'm a moron_. Emperor was still looming in front of him, looking for all the world like some kind of possessed suit of armor at its three-meter height. He dismissed it sheepishly, trying not to meet the eyes of his companions as he stepped forward once more, this time hopefully not drawing as many fearful eyes.

It was perhaps that sheepishness, combined with his intent search for a hotel or tavern or the like, that brought his guard down enough for someone to walk all the way up to him and grab his shoulder without him seeing it coming. Given that his pride wouldn't allow the thought of a civilian managing to sneak up like that, his immediate reaction was to draw a kunai and bring it up towards his assailant, only to have it clash metal-on-metal with their weapon-

And then shatter, because the kunai he'd drawn was the one he'd been carving holes out of earlier. Kame brought his hand up to detonate the emergency Windbomb beneath his coat, but stopped when he heard the voice from underneath the cloak of his opponent:

"Hey, kid. Can you chill out for a second?"

 _That's not_ … "Himei?" Kame turned to look more closely, but the one standing beside him was a young adult civilian with mundane dark hair, brown eyes, and unremarkable features. In fact, their face was almost entirely forgettable…

"Transformation jutsu, but yeah, it's me," the civilian said in Himei's voice. "Do you want to head back to my place?"

( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( ) - ( )

"You just… left?" Kame found it difficult to accept that his former compatriot had simply abandoned Orochimaru's cause without repercussion.

"Yeah," Himei replied, scratching his head awkwardly. "Grandmother was cool with it, and Lord Orochimaru's dead, so-"

"Oh, yeah," Kame interjected, "About that…" He searched his mind to try to find a way to impart the necessary information in a… positively phrased way, but found nothing, eventually having to settle with: "Orochimaru's not totally dead."

Himei's face shifted to confusion. "What?"

"He's not… completely dead yet." Realizing that that wasn't any more helpful, Kame anxiously kept speaking before Himei got the wrong idea: "He's gone for the moment, but he's gonna resurrect in nine days from a random Cursemarked underling- not counting the higher-ups, of course, but any one of the lower ranked lackeys are possible subjects."

"So I'm not gonna turn into Orochimaru, right?"

Kame nodded gravely. "You are not going to turn into Orochimaru."

Himei shook his head and sat back in his chair, looking up at the ceiling. They were in the dining room of a nice house right on the beachfront, and despite Kame's close scrutiny, it appeared to be a completely normal civilian dwelling. It was a little bit surreal to see the man he'd gone on missions with, captured with, _killed_ with, in such an incongruous setting.

A soft voice sounded out from the kitchen: "Honey, are these more… work friends?" heralded the arrival of a woman stepping out into the dining room. She was tall, and beautiful, with flowing dark brown hair and soft brown eyes, likely in her mid-thirties, and with a kindly smile that reminded him of his own mother's. She stuttered in her step, though, when she saw Kame, Haku, and Miriki's faces, and quickly revealed why.

"Honey, these are kids!"

Kame opened his mouth to protest, but closed it just as quickly. _Holy shit_ , he thought, _I'm fifteen_. It seemed incredibly stupid for him to be so affected by that realization, yet affected he was, because objectively his situation was, to say the very least, abnormal. _I wonder if_ -

"Did you have anything to do with kids getting dragged into your line of work?" The woman- _No, Himei's wife_ , Kame corrected as she poked him in the chest- asked with a fair hint of danger present in her tone.

"No," Himei immediately responded, perhaps a bit _too_ quickly. "I mean, no, not really. Orochimaru just showed up with these two."

"Mhm," his wife responded, clearly not impressed by his explanation, before turning to the other seated ninja in question and taking a much kinder tone: "Would you kids like anything to eat? If I'd known you were coming, I could have fixed something to be ready, but _unfortunately_ , my husband decided to spring this on me now."

"Sorry," Himei grinned. Kame expected him to complain, or to point out that it wasn't really his fault the way he always had around Orochimaru, but for once Himei seemed willing to bear the blame in a way he never had as a Sound ninja. "Anyway, what brought you kids to Bichimura?"

 _Bichimura_ … the name was familiar to Kame, and he soon realized why, which was followed by a storm of internal cursing. "Oh, shi-" his eyes flickered over towards the smiling (for now) woman next to Himei and he quickly revised his statement: "Uh, Himei- your daughter! What happened to your daughter!?"

"Oh, you guys came to make good on your promise." Himei's face split with a wide grin as he pointed up at the ceiling above them: "You don't need to worry, she's sleeping upstairs- _healthy_."

Kame let out a long breath, one little weight on his shoulders sliding away. For a second, he'd been terrified that one more life would be on his hands, this time one that he'd sworn to protect, but thankfully-

"Wait, how did you heal her?"

For the first time since they'd reunited, Himei's face flickered with an emotion nearing anger. "Orochimaru had a cure the entire time, but he pretended to still be working on it to keep me working under him. Grandmother gave it to me and told me I was free to go if I wanted."

Kame nodded his understanding, although internally he was wishing it had been that simple or easy for him and Haku. Himei seemed to notice his mixed feelings, because he took on a more sympathetic tone for his next few words: "Are you kids alright? Just before I left a week ago, Grandmother said you guys got taken in by the legal system."

Miriki snorted. "Not even close. You probably don't want to hear the whole story, but let's just say I had to pull in a massive favor to get my brother to plead their case, and even then- well, the only way that the Kage ended up voting to pardon them was with the requirement that they be sent on a suicide mission to wipe out all of Orochimaru's bases."

"What?" Himei and his wife said at the same time, the former outraged while the latter seemed more shocked. He continued with that same upset tone, "You two're just children, how the hell do the fu-" he hesitated, glanced at his wife, and then kept going- "the Kage get off forcing you into this shit?"

"Hell if I know," Miriki replied.

"Shit, does that mean you already passed by the Whirlpool base? Which ones have you gotten? Are there at least legal shinobi helping you? And what about Orochimaru?" Himei's flurry of questions seemed to confuse Miriki, so Kame stepped in to answer them.

"We already passed by the Whirlpool base, yes, but it was… dealt with before we got there, by the Tanikage." Himei reacted with a strange combination of anxiety and relief crossing his face, but no sadness or mourning. "We took down the Wind, Bear, Lightning, Stone, and Water villages, but the Tanikage got the Valley one, and the Rain and Waterfall both destroyed their own bases as well."

Himei's wife frowned and looked at them with a bit of curiosity creeping into her previous worry, evidently deeply confused by the fact that they'd played so large a part in the eradication of Orochimaru's empire, but Kame decided to ignore it for the moment and keep going. "What was next…? Oh, right, help from legal shinobi, well… 'suicide mission', right? They might send in people to clean up if we fail, but they're not going to keep us from dying first. As for Orochimaru, well, if we kill all of the Cursemarked people, he doesn't come back."

Himei set his jaw and flickered his eyes upwards, probably considering the consequences of Orochimaru's return for his family. Finally, he took a deep breath and appeared to come to a decision of some sort: "Okay, if I heard you right, that leaves two bases. I'll come with-"

"No," Haku interrupted him. Kame whipped around- _Why would she give up free aid? From an S-class missing-ninja, no less… what is she thinking?_ "We can handle this. You finally got a chance to be with your family, and if you get hurt or even spotted, they'll realize you're still alive and hunt you down."

 _She's right_ , Kame realized. _Hell, but I'm selfish_. He hadn't thought about the implications of Himei aiding them, but Haku had hit the mark with her statement. There was something else, too, behind her expression and voice as she continued: "You have a daughter, Himei. Don't let her grow up without you."

 _That's it_. She'd grown up an orphan, so she knew likely better than anyone what a bad outcome of Himei's assistance would lead to. _And after that_ , Kame thought, _I can't ask him to come along either_. "Stick with your family, Himei."

Defiance, worry, and consternation each flashed across Himei's features, but he finally settled on an expression of gratitude. "Thank you. By all rights, you shouldn't be good people, but I'm really glad Orochimaru didn't get the chance to take that away from you."

Kame nodded, feeling a swell of pride as his superior of the previous year acknowledged him, but quickly returning to earth in order to settle some final issues out. "We need to go book rooms at the hotel, right?"

"Absolutely not." The decree came from an unexpected place, as Himei's wife put her hands on her hips in a stance that clearly denied any argument. "You three are staying in the guest room and eating the dinner I cooked."

"Yuna, I-" Himei rolled his eyes. "Actually, sure. Feel free to stay as long as you like."

Kame hesitated, first digging through his mental checklist to make sure that their presence wouldn't bring danger to their hosts, but just as he decided that it would probably be okay, Miriki beat him to the punch. "I would love to eat your incredible food, Yuna."

 _Wait, is he-_ Kame shot a glance towards Miriki, but caught no trace of flirtatiousness or anything of the like in his expression, only grace and tact. _Huh, I guess he can turn it off after all. Go figure_ …

The rest of the night passed uneventfully, as all parties present shared stories and opinions about a variety of subjects. Kame slipped up and accidentally mentioned an assassination mission he and Himei had undertook, earning the man a blow to the back of the head from his wife, but Miriki invented a backstory for the assassination target as a serial killer crime lord pedophile that saved him from further punishment. From then on, they stuck to safer subjects, eventually landing on the origin of Himei and Yuna's relationship just as the finished food was brought to the table for them to eat.

With an abundance of sideways glances that altogether too much resembled the awkward teenage romances Miriki had struck up with various kunoichi for Kame's tastes, Himei glowingly recounted his encounters with Yuna working at the Hidden Mist's local flower shop- _Really?_ \- while she chipped in her own descriptions of the rugged Mist ninja who stopped by to buy something each and every time he returned from a mission.

When they arrived at the start of Himei's years with Orochimaru, the tone got quite a bit darker. Himei remained calm, but his eyes lost the happy gleam they'd held earlier and his voice turned resentful: "When Aisuru got sick, I couldn't… I wasn't sure what to do. Orochimaru offered me a chance to save her, and I took it that same night, but that meant faking my murder of Yuna and Aisuru and relocating here."

The story echoed Kame's own experiences in defecting, and clearly Haku had gotten the same impression because when he glanced over towards her, she was already gazing into his eyes. Himei didn't notice this and kept going, "But I have no regrets and I'd do it a thousand times over again. There's no better reason to do the things I've done than to protect the ones I cared about."

That phrasing belied that perhaps Himei did understand the situation of Kame and Haku more than he'd let on, but Kame was distracted from sparing that any more thought as Haku's eyes went from anxious to grateful. "I'm never going to pay Kame back for doing what he did for me," she said softly as Himei trailed off.

Kame tried to formulate a response but instead faltered and felt himself blush, opting finally to just look away and try to ignore the surge of accomplishment he felt at those words. From that point on, the conversation trended much further into safe ground, and at the end of the night when everyone else had dropped out to go sleep, Kame found himself sitting on the beachfront, looking out at the sea, and just… thinking.

 _I can't ignore it any more_ , he thought. _The genjutsu is gone, but I still care about her more than a teammate, more than a friend. I want to be there for her whenever she needs me- Hell, I want to be there for her even when she doesn't need me. Being around her makes me happy, even when I have no right to be…_

 _But_. He thought of all they'd been through, all the bridges he'd burned to get this far. Other than Miriki, he had no friends left in the Hidden Sand, even if they _did_ make it back. Haku was essentially all he had, just as he was all she had, and if he ruined that by declaring his feelings… _No_. Just thinking about voicing his attraction to her out loud was disquieting to him, and if she didn't reciprocate, things would never be the same.

"Holy crap," said the voice Kame really didn't want to hear right now, trailing in from behind him, "Dude, grow a pair."

"Shut up," he responded petulantly.

"Why are you so terrified of just asking her out?' Miriki dropped down beside him, staring off into the same reflected moon upon the waters that he was. "She cares about you, too, you know."

Kame knew better than to challenge his friend when it came to judging people's emotions, yet… _That's not it_ , he realized. _I know she likes me, I can see it in her reactions, in her eyes. If I'm not worried about that, then what is it?_

Giving voice to the thoughts as they entered his head, Kame spoke with a stilted awkwardness. "I don't… the problem isn't that. It's… I can't figure… I…"

"Dude, I was better around girls in second grade than you are now," Miriki deadpanned.

"You know that's not it. I just… she's _everything_ , you know? We're too reliant on each other-" and then it clicked in Kame's head. "I'm her only friend, and I can't put her in a position like that. It's taking advantage of her loneliness."

"Ha!" Miriki rolled his eyes, trademark smirk straying back across his features. "That's a weird way to say 'I don't have the balls to ask out the girl I like'."

"Shut up."

"Listen, Kame." Miriki finally seemed to grow serious, turning to face his teammate and laying a hand on his shoulder, "I'm really sick of watching you two pine for each other like some kind of cheap melodrama. I care about Haku, and she _really_ cares about you, and it doesn't take kekkeigenkai eyes to figure out that the only reason you two aren't together is that neither of you have the confidence to take the first step."

Kame's melancholy, as always when he spoke with Miriki, gradually gave way to annoyance. "Hey-"

"I'm not gonna put it on her to talk to you, someone she idolizes, and literally the only person other than me who cares about her," Miriki finished with an air of finality, "And honestly I guess all of this is none of my business. That said, I'm gonna tell _her_ about this in a month."

"Wha- You can't!" Kame protested, but his friend was already walking away.

"Can and will," came the reply tossed over Miriki's shoulder as he entered the house, probably to go to sleep for real this time around. Once again, Kame was left alone on the beach, now slightly- but only slightly- more in control of the confused emotions inside of him.


End file.
